.4.H4i 


THE  MOST  BEAUTIFl 
BOOK   EVER   WRITT: 


O^ 


u 


NOV   6   1918 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  LUKE 


BY 


V 


D.  A.  HAYES 

Professor  of  New  Testament  Interpretation  in  the  Graduate 
School  of  Theology,  Garrett  Biblical  Institute 


NEW    YORK:  EATON     &    MAINS 
CINCINNATI :  JENNINGS  &  GRAHAM 


Copyright,  1913,  by 
D.  A.  HAYES 


TO 
JAMES  HAYES 

A  PHYSICIAN  BELOVED   BY  MANY 
HEltPED  IN  BOTH  BODY  AND  SOUL 


CONTENTS 

PART  ONE:  THE  AUTHOR 

PAGE 

I.  The  New  Testament  Data 3 

II.  The  Name  "Luke" 6 

III.  Luke,  the  Companion  of  Paul 12 

IV.  Luke,  the  Physician 19 

V.  Luke,  the  Musician 28 

VI.  Luke,  the  Artist 37 

VII.  Luke,  the  Gentile 40 

VIII.Luke,  of  Antioch 42 

IX.  Luke,  the  Freedman 46 

X.  Luke  in  Later  Tradition 49 

XL  An  Outhne  Biography 50 

PART  TWO:  THE  GOSPEL 

I.  Sources  of  the  Gospel 57 

II.  Date  of  the  Gospel 63 

III.  Place  of  Writing 66 

IV.  The  Gospel  for  the  Gentiles 68 

V.  The  Gospel  of  an  Educated  Man 87 

VI.  The  Gospel  of  the  Physician 102 

VII.  The  Gospel  of  Childhood 113 

VIII.  The  Gospel  of  Womanhood 115 

IX.  The  Gospel  for  the  Poor 127 

X.  The  Gospel  for  the  Outcasts 142 

XI.  The  Pauhne  Gospel 147 

XII.  The  Gospel  of  Jesus,  Our  Brother-Man 160 

XIII.  The  Gospel  of  Praise 176 

XIV.  The  Gospel  and  the  Man  Luke 182 

V 


FOREWORD 

Luke  is  one  of  the  most  lovable  characters 
in  all  church  history.  The  Gospel  accord- 
ing to  Luke  is  one  of  the  most  attractive 
books  in  the  world's  literature.  The  truth 
of  these  two  facts  and  the  connection  be- 
tween them  ought  to  be  apparent  in  these 
pages. 

Reader,  have  you  thought  that  you  knew 
the  evangelist  Luke.'^  Look  into  these  pages 
and  see  if  there  is  not  more  in  the  man  than 
you  ever  suspected.  Have  you  thought  you 
were  acquainted  with  the  Gospel  according 
to  Luke?  Look  through  these  pages  and 
see  whether  there  are  not  some  beauties  and 
some  riches  in  it  which  you  never  had 
noticed.  Then,  if  you  come  to  love  the 
man  and  the  book  a  little  more  than  you 
ever  did  before,  we  shall  have  our  reward. 


vii 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

I.  Introductions  to  the  New  Testament  by  Weiss, 
MofFatt,  Dods,  Bacon,  Salmon,  Adeney,  Pullan, 
and  others ;  The  Books  of  the  Bible ;  Book  by  Book ; 
The  Teachings  of  the  Books;  Farrar,  The  Mes- 
sages of  the  Books;  McClymont,  The  New  Testa- 
ment and  Its  Writers;  Schaff,  History  of  the 
Christian  Church,  Vol.  I;  Weizsacker,  The  Apos- 
tolic Age. 

II.  Commentaries  on  the  Third  Gospel  by  Plum- 
mer,  in  the  International  Critical  Commentary 
series;  Bruce,  in  the  Expositor's  Greek  Testament 
series;  Godet;  Farrar,  in  the  Cambridge  Greek 
Testament  series ;  Adeney,  in  the  Century  Bible ; 
Garvie,  in  the  Westminster  New  Testament;  Bur- 
ton, in  the  Expositor's  Bible. 

III.  Special  Studies  by  Selwyn,  Luke  the 
Prophet ;  Hamack,  Luke  the  Physician ;  Ramsay, 
Saint  Paul  the  Traveller  and  the  Roman  Citizen, 
and,  Was  Christ  Bom  in  Bethlehem.'';  Hobart,  The 
Medical  Language  of  Saint  Luke. 


PART  ONE:  THE  AUTHOR 


THE   AUTHOR 

I.  The  New  Testament  Data 

There  are  three  synoptic  Gospels:  the 
Gospel  according  to  Mark,  the  Gospel 
according  to  Matthew,  and  the  Gospel 
according  to  Luke.  The  third  of  these  has 
been  said  by  Renan  to  be  ''the  most  beau- 
tiful book  ever  written."^  A  beautiful 
book  is  in  all  probability  the  product  of  a 
beautiful  soul.  The  most  beautiful  book 
ever  written,  especially  since  it  deals  with 
spiritual  themes  and  is  the  story  of  The 
Perfect  Life,  must  have  had  an  author 
worthy  of  our  most  intimate  acquaintance, 
a  man  of  noble  soul  and  adequate  training, 
interesting  to  us  in  every  detail  of  his 
career  and  in  every  phase  of  his  character. 

We  would  like  to  know  all  about  Homer 
and  all  about  Shakespeare,  or  at  least  as 

»  Renan,  Les  Evangiles,  p.  283,  "C'est  Ic  plus  beaulivre  qu'il  y  ait." 

3 


4  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

much  as  we  know  about  Martin  Luther 
and  John  Wesley;  but  the  multitude  of 
details  concerning  the  private  and  the 
public  life  of  Luther  and  Wesley  utterly 
fail  us  when  we  come  to  these  greatest 
geniuses  of  our  literature.  We  know  com- 
paratively little  about  the  personal  life  of 
Homer  or  of  Shakespeare,  and  we  know 
comparatively  little  about  the  author  of 
this  *'most  beautiful  book  ever  written." 
Jesus  we  know,  and  Peter  we  know,  and 
John  we  know,  and  Paul  we  know,  and  we 
know  something  of  most  of  the  twelve 
apostles  and  of  many  of  the  deacons  and 
evangelists  of  the  early  church;  and  we 
owe  most  of  our  knowledge  of  these  men 
to  the  evangelist  Luke.  We  owe  more  of 
it  to  him  than  to  any  other  man  who  ever 
lived  or  wrote  about  them.  But  Luke 
tells  us  little  or  nothing  about  himself. 
He  never  mentions  his  own  name  either 
in  the  Gospel  or  in  the  book  of  Acts.  He 
makes  one  reference  to  himself  in  the  use 
of  the  personal  pronoun  in  the  preface  to 
the  Gospel,  "It  seemed  good  to  7ne  also  to 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  6 

write,"^  and  the  use  of  the  plural  pro- 
nouns "we"  and  "us"  in  the  book  of  Acts 
has  been  generally  supposed  to  indicate 
the  entrance  of  Luke  himself  upon  the 
scene. 

Luke's  name,  however,  appears  only  three 
times  in  the  New  Testament:  in  Philem. 
24,  "Mark,  Aristarchus,  Demas,  Luke, 
my  fellow  workers"  salute  you;  Col.  4.  14, 
"Luke,  the  beloved  physician,  and  Demas 
salute  you,"  and  2  Tim.  4.  10,  11,  where 
after  declaring,  "Demas  forsook  me,  hav- 
ing loved  this  present  world,"  Paul  adds, 
"Only  Luke  is  with  me."  We  notice  that 
in  each  of  these  three  passages  Luke  and 
Demas  are  mentioned  together,  Demas 
being  a  fellow  worker  in  the  first  two  pas- 
sages, but  having  forsaken  Paul  in  the 
last  of  them,  while  Luke  alone  remained 
faithful  and  present  with  him.  It  is  also 
worth  noticing  that  in  the  immediate  con- 
text of  each  of  these  passages  the  name 
of  the  other  evangelist  and  author  of  a 
Gospel  narrative  who  was  not  an  apostle 

I  Luke  1,  3.  . 


6  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

occurs.     Mark  is  mentioned  in  Philem.  24; 
Col.  4.  10;  and  2  Tim.  4.  11. 

Upon  the  basis  of  these  three  passages 
in  which  his  name  occurs  what  facts  may 
we  glean  concerning  the  author  of  the 
most  beautiful  book  in  all  literature  ? 

II.  The  Name  "Luke" 

We  begin  with  the  name  itself.  1.  "Luke," 
in  the  Greek  AovKdg,  is  a  very  uncommon 
name.  We  are  told  that  it  is  not  to  be 
found  in  the  writings  of  any  classical  author 
or  upon  any  Greek  or  Latin  inscription,  and 
that  it  does  not  occur  before  New  Testament 
times.  It  is  a  peculiar  name,  distinctive  by 
its  very  strangeness  and  infrequency.  It 
seems  to  be  a  contracted  or  shortened  form 
of  "Lucanus,"  in  the  Greek  AovKavSg  (which 
is  found  in  inscriptions),  as  "Apollos"  was 
a  shortened  form  of  "Apollonius,"  and 
"Silas"  of  "Silvanus."  These  three  men, 
Lucas,  Apollos,  and  Silas,  were  all  friends 
of  the  apostle  Paul,  and  in  their  ministry 
with  him  they  must  have  been  thrown 
into  intimate  association  with  each  other; 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  7 

and  they  all  had  nicknames,  or,  rather, 
shortened  and  abbreviated  names  by  which 
they  were  called  in  preference  to  the  full 
name,  which  was  too  long  for  common  or 
familiar  use.^  In  the  earliest  copies  of  the 
Latin  Bible  the  name  "Lucanus"  frequently 
occurs  in  the  title  of  the  Gospel,  "Cata 
Lucanum." 

2.  Dean  Plump tre  has  called  attention  to 
the  fact  that  the  only  other  noted  man  of 
this  immediate  period  in  history  who  bore 
the  name  "Lucanus"  was  the  Latin  poet, 
the  author  of  the  *'Pharsalia,"  the  epic 
poem  which  set  forth  the  struggle  between 
Julius  Csesar  and  Pompey  for  the  supreme 
power  at  Rome.^  Now,  this  Lucanus  was 
born  in  the  year  A.  D.  39,  and  therefore 
he  was  probably  thirty  or  forty  years 
younger  than  our  Luke,  the  author  of  the 
third  Gospel.  Dean  Plump  tre  has  made 
this    further    most    interesting    suggestion: 

»  Other  examples  are:  "Amplias"  for  "Ampliatus"  (Rom.  16.  8),  "Olym- 
pas"  for  "Olympiodorus"  (Rom.  16.  15),  "Demas"  for  "Demetrius" 
(Col.  4.  14),  "Epaphras"  for  "Epaphroditus"  (Col.  4.  12),  "Zenas" 
for  "Zenodorus"  (Titus  3.  13),  "Antipas"  for  "AntipatrLs"  (Rev.  2.  13), 
"Stephanas"  for  "Stephanephorua"  (1  Cor.  16.  15).  See  Dictionary 
of  Christ  and  the  Gospels,  ii,  p.  83. 

>  Books  of  the  Bible.    New  Testament,  pp.  74,  75. 


8  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

that  it  is  just  possible  that  the  poet  Lu- 
canus  was  named  after  the  physician  Luke. 
If  Luke  were  a  beloved  physician  in  the 
family  when  the  boy  Lucanus  was  born, 
the  father  and  mother  may  have  decided 
to  show  their  appreciation  of  him  and  his 
services  by  naming  the  child  after  him. 
Every  physician  is  likely  to  have  name- 
sakes, given  him  in  just  this  way. 

Is  there  any  good  reason  for  supposing 
that  there  was  any  personal  relation  be- 
tween these  two  Lukes  in  this  period  of 
history  ?  Yes,  for  if  Luke  the  physician 
and  Lucanus  the  poet  were  lifelong  friends, 
and  the  physician  was  on  intimate  and 
trusted  terms  of  familiarity  with  the  poet's 
family,  then  Luke  would  be  sure  to  make 
them  acquainted  with  his  beloved  master, 
Paul,  and  through  Luke  they  would  be 
sure  to  hear  about  and  to  become  more 
or  less  interested  in  Paul's  preaching 
and  Paul's  apostolic  career.  Have  we  any 
indications  of  any  such  acquaintanceship 
with  or  interest  in  Paul  on  the  part  of 
any  members  of  the  family  of  Lucanus  ? 


r 
BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  9 

(1)  In  the  eighteenth  chapter  of  Acts  we 
read  that  the  Jews  in  Corinth  seized  the 
apostle  Paul  and  brought  him  before  the 
proconsul  of  Achaia,  whose  name  was 
Gallio,  and  charged  him  with  persuading 
men  to  worship  God  contrary  to  the  law. 
When  Paul  was  about  to  make  answer  to 
that  charge  Gallio  interrupted  him  and 
told  the  Jews  that  if  Paul  had  been  guilty 
of  any  criminal  behavior,  he  would  try 
him,  but  if  he  were  simply  preaching  a  new 
form  of  Jewish  doctrine,  that  was  a  matter 
upon  which  he  did  not  choose  to  sit  in 
judgment.  Then  he  drove  them  from  the 
judgment  seat,  and  they  were  a  most  dis- 
appointed and  angry  set  of  men.^  They 
had  expected  Gallio  to  put  Paul  in  prison 
or  to  stop  his  evangelistic  work  in  one  way 
or  another.  They  found  him  seemingly 
favorable  to  the  prisoner  and  indisposed  to 
interfere  in  any  way  with  his  mission  and 
teaching.  What  was  the  explanation  of 
this  indifference  to  the  complaints  of  the 
Jews  and  this  willingness  to  befriend  their 

>  Acta  18.  12-17. 


10  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

prisoner,  Paul  ?  This  Gallic  was  the  uncle 
of  Lucanus  the  poet.  Had  Luke  the 
evangelist  told  Luke  the  poet  all  about 
Paul  and  his  work,  and  had  Luke  the  poet 
told  his  uncle  Gallio  enough  of  these  things 
to  prejudice  him  in  Paul's  faVor  ?  That 
would  seem  to  be  possible  at  least. 

(2)  Then  in  the  time  of  Augustine  and 
Jerome  fourteen  letters  were  extant  which 
were  supposed  to  have  passed  between  the 
Latin  philosopher  Seneca  and  the  apostle 
Paul.  Those  which  have  come  down  to 
our  day  have  been  pronounced  spurious, 
but  at  that  time  they  were  believed  to  be 
genuine,  and  that  very  belief  bore  witness 
to  the  fact  that  there  was  a  widespread 
tradition  in  the  early  church  that  there 
had  been  some  personal  acquaintance  and 
intercourse  between  Seneca  and  Paul. 
Seneca  was  an  oflScial  in  the  court  of 
Nero  while  Paul  was  a  prisoner  at  Rome. 
We  read  that  Paul's  Gospel  became  known 
through  the  whole  Praetorian  guard, ^  and 
that  certain  members  of  Csesar's  household 

1  PhU.  1.  13. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  11 

were  converted,^  and  it  is  altogether  prob- 
able that  Seneca  would  hear  about  these 
things  and  would  be  interested  to  talk 
with  such  a  man  as  Paul  had  proved  him- 
self to  be. 

Bishop  Lightfoot  has  written  an  essay  on 
Saint  Paul  and  Seneca,^  in  which  he  has 
made  a  most  interesting  collection  of  the 
coincidences  in  thought  and  in  language  to 
be  found  in  the  extant  and  genuine  writings 
of  these  two  men;  and  if  these  coincidences 
are  not  sufficient  to  prove  that  the  two 
men  knew  each  other  and  were  acquainted 
with  each  other's  views,  they  go  very  far, 
dt  least,  toward  making  that  supposition 
probable.  Now,  Seneca  was  another  uncle 
of  Lucanus  the  poet.  If  Luke  the  evan- 
gelist was  on  terms  of  intimacy  with  the 
members  of  this  family,  we  could  find  in 
that  fact  an  explanation  of  the  actual 
friendliness  of  Gallio  and  of  the  traditional 
friendship  of  Seneca  for  the  apostle  Paul. 
The  name  of  the  evangelist  Luke,  then, 
uncommon  as  it  is,  and  having  only  one 

1  Phil.  4.  22.  « Commentary  on  Philippians,  pp.  270-333. 


12  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

parallel  in  the  history  of  this  time,  may 
furnish  a  suggestive  link  with  the  family 
of  the  poet  Lucanus  and  so  help  us  to 
explain  the  recorded  and  traditional  rela- 
tions between  certain  members  of  this 
family  and  the  apostle  Paul. 

III.  Luke,  the  Companion  of  Paul 

We  turn  back  to  the  three  passages  in 
which  Luke's  name  occurs  and  we  find 
that  they  all  bear  witness  to  another  fact 
concerning  him,  namely,  that  he  was  for  a 
part  of  his  life,  at  least,  the  close  com- 
panion of  the  apostle  Paul.  1.  We  have 
noticed  that  at  certain  points  in  the  nar- 
rative of  the  book  of  Acts  the  pronoun 
"we"  occurs.  It  is  understood  usually 
that  this  pronoun  marks  the  entrance  of 
Luke  himself  upon  the  scene.  If  so,  Paul 
finds  Luke  at  Troas  and  takes  him,  with 
Timothy  and  Silas,  into  Macedonia  on  the 
first  foreign  missionary  journey  from  the 
continent  of  Asia  into  the  continent  of 
Europe.^     Here   Paul   seems   to   have   left 

'  Acts  16.  10. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  13 

Luke  in  charge  of  the  church  at  Philippi, 
since  the  pronoun  "they"  takes  the  place 
of  the  pronoun  "we"  in  Acts  17.  1  and  the 
narrative  following.  This  was  in  A.  D.  51. 
Seven  years  later,  in  A.  D.  58,  Paul  finds 
Luke  again  here  at  Philippi,^  and  Luke 
goes  with  Paul  on  his  journey  to  Jerusa- 
lem .^  He  was  with  Paul  at  the  time  of  his 
arrest  and  went  with  him  to  Csesarea.  He 
remained  with  him  during  the  two  years 
of  the  Csesarean  imprisonment  and  accom- 
panied him  on  the  voyage  to  Rome.  At 
the  close  of  the  narrative  of  the  book  of 
Acts  Luke  is  still  with  Paul;  and  from 
2  Tim.  4.  11  we  learn  that  he  was  Paul's 
sole  remaining  companion  at  the  time  of 
the  writing  of  that  epistle.  He  probably 
stayed  at  his  master's  side  to  the  day  of 
Paul's  martyrdom. 

Are  there  any  other  Scriptures,  except 
these  passages  in  which  his  name  occurs 
or  the  pronoun  "we"  discloses  his  pres- 
ence, in  which  we  may  have  any  glimpse  of 
Luke's  ministry  ?    2.  It  has  been  suggested 

1  Acts  20.  5,  6.  2  Acts  21.  15-18. 


14  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

by  Epiphanius  that  Luke  was  one  of  the 
seventy  sent  out  by  our  Lord  as  the  fore- 
runners in  his  village  ministry.^  Probably 
the  only  reason  for  such  a  suggestion  is 
that  Luke  is  the  only  one  of  the  synoptics 
who  has  made  any  extended  record  of  this 
evangelistic  tour. 

3.  Theophylact  thought  that  Luke  was 
the  unnamed  companion  of  Cleopas  in  his 
walk  to  Emmaus  on  the  resurrection  day. 
This  narrative  too  is  peculiar  to  the  third 
Gospel;  but  if  Luke  were  a  Gentile,  as  we 
shall  have  reason  to  conclude,  that  fact 
would  rule  out  either  of  these  possibilities. 
The  seventy  were,  of  course,  all  Jews;  and 
the  companion  of  Cleopas  and  resident  of 
his  home  was  a  Jewess  or  a  Jew. 

4.  It  has  been  conjectured  that  Luke  was 
one  of  the  Greeks  who  asked  to  be  intro- 
duced to  Jesus  at  the  time  of  the  last  feast 
in  Jerusalem,^  but  even  this  suggestion  does 
not  seem  to  come  within  the  realm  of  possi- 
bility, for  Luke  declares  in  the  preface  to 
his  Gospel  that  he  is  about  to  record  what 

»  Luke  10.  1-20.  «  John  12.  20. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  15 

eyewitnesses  had  reported  to  him,  and  thus 
clearly  places  himself  among  those  who 
were  wholly  dependent  upon  tradition  for 
what  they  knew  of  the  gospel  story.  If  he 
had  been  an  eyewitness  himself  at  any 
point,  he  surely  would  have  claimed  first- 
hand authority  for  his  narrative  in  that 
place.  He  makes  no  such  claim.  We 
conclude,  therefore,  that  he  belonged  to 
the  second  generation  of  believers  and 
that  he  himself  never  saw  Jesus. 

5.  However,  in  1  Cor.  8.  18,  19,  Paul 
speaks  of  some  brother  whose  praise  in 
the  gospel  was  spread  through  all  the 
churches  and  who  had  been  appointed  by 
the  churches  to  travel  with  him,  collecting 
money  for  the  poor  saints  in  Jerusalem. 
This  unnamed  brother  may  have  been 
Luke.  He  traveled  with  Paul  on  so  many 
other  occasions,  and  he  went  with  Paul 
when  this  collection  was  finally  carried  to 
Jerusalem.  If  he  had  labored  in  its  gath- 
ering, he  deserved  to  have  some  share  in 
its  distribution;  or  he  may  have  been  in- 
trusted to  see  it  safely  to  its  destination. 


16  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Anyway,  we  are  sure  from  our  Scriptures 
that  Luke  was  the  close  and  congenial 
companion  of  the  apostle  Paul. 

They  must  have  liked  each  other,  be- 
cause they  were  like  spirits.  They  were 
both  educated  men,  with  scholarly  habits 
and  with  literary  and  cultured  tastes. 
They  were  great-hearted,  liberal-minded, 
broad-spirited.  They  must  have  influenced 
and  strengthened  each  other  in  the  de- 
velopment of  their  natural  tendencies. 
They  were  probably  about  the  same  age, 
and  they  must  have  been  drawn  to  each 
other  fi'om  their  first  meeting,  and  their 
continued  and  lifelong  friendship  proved 
their  perfect  congeniality.  Philip  Schaff 
thinks  that  they  were  foreordained  to  be 
comrades,^  and  he  points  out  other  notable 
friendships  in  church  history,  at  the  time 
of  the  Reformation  between  Luther  and 
Melanchthon,  Zwingli  and  OEcolampadius, 
Calvin  and  Beza,  Cranmer,  Latimer,  and 
Ridley;  and  in  the  eighteenth  century  be- 
tween  the   two    Wesley s    and    Whitefield; 

>  History  of  the  Christian  Church,  vol.  i,  p.  649. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  17 

and  then  in  this  same  apostoHc  period 
between  Peter  and  Mark.  The  Master 
sent  out  the  apostles  in  the  beginning 
two  by  two;  and  this  recognized  neces- 
sity for  companionship  and  encourage- 
ment in  the  formative  period  of  the 
church  has  manifested  itself  in  all  the 
great  creative  periods  in  church  history 
since  that  time. 

No  one  will  ever  be  able  to  estimate  how 
much  service  in  the  cause  of  Christ  these 
congenial  companionships  between  Chris- 
tian colaborers  have  been.  It  may  be  that 
we  owe  to  them  the  very  existence  of  two 
of  our  four  Gospels.  Two  of  these  Gos- 
pels were  written  by  apostles — that  accord- 
ing to  Matthew  and  that  according  to 
John.  The  other  two  were  written  by  the 
two  congenial  companions  of  the  two 
greatest  apostles,  Peter  and  Paul.  It  is 
usually  supposed  that  Mark's  record  of 
the  life  of  Jesus  was  the  first  to  be  written, 
and  that  it  was  in  some  sense  a  summary 
of  the  teaching  and  preaching  of  Peter, 
whose    interpreter    and    companion    and 


18  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

"son"  in  the  gospel  Mark  was.^  Peter  and 
Mark  were  both  men  of  sanguine  tempera- 
ment. They  were  both  men  of  restless 
energy,  ready  to  jump  at  conclusions  rather 
than  to  take  time  to  reason  them  out. 
They  were  both  liable  to  make  mistakes, 
and  they  were  both  ready  to  repent  as 
soon  as  they  realized  that  a  mistake  had 
been  made.  Paul  could  never  have  en- 
dured steady  companionship  with  a  man 
like  John  Mark.  He  would  rather  part 
company  with  Barnabas  than  keep  com- 
pany with  him.^  But  Peter  and  Mark 
were  a  congenial  pair,  and  the  Gospel 
record  written  by  Mark  represents  these 
two  men  in  its  general  characteristics,  brief, 
energetic,  full  of  action,  and  unliterary  as 
it  is.  On  the  contrary,  the  Gospel  written 
by  Luke  is  the  longest  and  the  most 
literary  of  the  Gospels.  It  was  the  prod- 
uct of  the  cultured  and  congenial  com- 
panion of  the  apostle  Paul.  Possibly, 
however,  there  was  a  still  better  or  more 
imperative    reason    than    mere    personal 

« 1  Pet.  5.  13.  »  Acts  15.  37-40. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  19 

pleasure  in  comradeship  to  account  for 
the  close  connection  existing  for  years  be- 
tween the  apostle  Paul  and  his  traveling 
companion,  Luke. 

IV.  Luke,  the  Physician 
We  turn  again  to  Col.  4.  14  and  we  find 
that  Paul  not  only  calls  Luke  "beloved," 
but  his  "beloved  physician,"  and  we  recall 
that  just  before  Luke  joined  Paul  at  Troas 
in  that  first  missionary  advance  into  the 
continent  of  Europe  Paul  had  been  suffer- 
ing from   some   infirmity   of   the   flesh   in 
Galatia,^  and  it  may  well  have  been  that 
he  was  dreading  a  recurrence  of  that  ex- 
perience and  asked  Luke  to  go  along  with 
him  to  help  to  ward  it  off  or  to  care  for 
him  if  he  were  again  disabled  by  it.     We 
recall  also  that  when  Luke  rejoins  Paul  at 
Philippi  and  accompanies  him  on  the  last 
voyage  to  Jerusalem  it  is  just  after  Paul 
has  been  suffering  again  from  an  affliction 
in  which  he  had  even  despaired  of  his  life.^ 
From    this    time    on    Luke    remains    con- 
ical. 4. 13.  2  2  Cor.  1.9. 


20  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

stantly  at  his  side.  Paul  doubtless  needed 
the  continuous  attention  of  a  physician 
during  these  closing  years  of  his  life. 

Luke  was  an  attendant  physician,  but, 
more  than  that,  he  was  Paul's  beloved 
companion  and  friend.  That  fact  throws  a 
deal  of  light  upon  his  character  and  goes 
far  to  make  him  a  model  for  all  men  in  his 
profession.  Luke  must  have  been  thor- 
oughly competent,  or  Paul  would  not  have 
trusted  him.  We  want  the  men  into  whose 
hands  we  put  the  preservation  of  our  lives 
to  have  the  best  education  that  the  schools 
can  furnish  them  and  plenty  of  practical 
experience  before  they  begin  to  make  any 
experiments  upon  us.  ■  Now,  the  best  med- 
ical education  in  Paul's  day  was  to  be 
found  among  the  Greeks,  and  all  of  the 
great  medical  authorities  among  the  Greeks 
whose  works  are  extant  were  Greeks  of 
Asia  Minor.  Hippocrates  can  scarcely  be 
called  an  exception,  for  he  was  born  and 
lived  on  the  island  of  Cos,  off  the  coast  of 
Caria.  Galen  came  from  Pergamus  in 
Mysia,  Dioscorides  from  Anazarba  in  Ci- 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  21 

licia,  and  Aretseus  from  Cappadocia.  These 
were  the  great  masters  in  the  medical 
profession,  and  they  were  all  Asiatic 
Greeks. 

The  great  university  in  Asia  Minor  in 
Luke's  day  was  situated  at  Tarsus,  which 
was  the  home  of  Paul.  There  was  no 
other  place  in  Asia  Minor  or  in  the  world 
of  that  day  where  Luke  could  get  as  good 
a  medical  education  as  he  could  at  Tarsus. 
If  he  went  to  school  there,  he  may  have 
met  Paul  either  in  the  university  or  on  the 
streets  of  that  city;  and  if  they  became 
schoolboy  friends  and  discovered  their  con- 
geniality of  spirit  in  those  early  days  be- 
fore either  of  them  had  been  converted  to 
the  Christian  faith,  it  would  go  far  to 
explain  their  immediate  union  of  fortunes 
and  communion  of  interests  when  they 
met  in  after  years  at  Troas.  Paul  knew 
that  Luke  was  a  thoroughly  educated  and 
competent  physician  and  was  willing  to 
trust  the  treatment  of  his  case  in  his  hands 
without  any  hesitation.  If  he  had  known 
Luke  in  Tarsus  in  early  youth,  and  had 


22  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

known  all  about  his  university  training 
there,  at  Troas  he  would  learn  all  about 
Luke's  experience  as  a  physician  in  the 
long  years  that  had  elapsed  since  those 
university  days. 

It  has  been  suggested  that  Luke  must 
have  practiced  medicine,  for  a  time  at 
least,  on  one  of  the  vessels  plying  up  and 
down  the  Mediterranean,  since  he  shows 
such  an  accurate  acquaintance  with  tech- 
nical nautical  terms  in  his  description  of 
the  voyage  and  the  shipwreck  in  the 
twenty-seventh  chapter  of  the  book  of 
Acts.  We  have  already  found  reason  to 
suppose  that  he  may  have  been  the  trusted 
physician  in  the  family  of  Lucanus  the 
poet,  and  so  have  come  into  contact  with 
such  men  as  Gallio  and  Seneca.  He  may 
have  been  the  physician  as  well  as  the 
friend  of  Theophilus,  the  man  for  whom 
he  wrote  his  two  volumes  of  history;  and 
this  Theophilus  must  have  been  a  man  of 
influence  and  prominence  in  the  Christian 
Church  of  the  early  days.  We  shall  see 
later  that  Luke  may  have  had  confidential 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  23 

relations  as  physician  with  certain  mem- 
bers of  the  royal  court  in  Palestine.  All 
the  indications  agree  in  leading  us  to  the 
conclusion  that  Luke  had  had  a  varied 
and  an  unusually  successful  career  as  a 
physician  after  leaving  school  and  before 
joining  Paul  at  Troas. 

He  had  had  most  excellent  training  in 
the  beginning,  and  now  he  had  years  of 
experience  behind  him.  He  was  no  longer 
young  and  untried.  Paul  was  more  ready 
to  trust  him  on  that  account.  A  young 
physician  is  always  at  a  disadvantage  as 
compared  with  a  young  lawyer  or  a  young 
preacher.  Theoretical  knowledge  may  sat- 
isfy people  in  theology  and  law;  and  to  the 
young  man  who  knows  nothing  but  what  he 
has  learned  from  his  books  they  seem  will- 
ing to  intrust  without  much  hesitation  the 
care  of  their  property  and  of  their  souls. 
But  with  their  bodies  they  usually  are 
more  cautious.  Their  physician  must  have 
theoretical  knowledge,  to  be  sure;  but  to 
this  knowledge  he  must  have  added  prac- 
tical experience  before  they  feel  safe  in  his 


24.  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

hands.  So  the  young  physician  must  wait 
until  the  wrinkles  settle  like  weary-winged 
birds  on  his  forehead  and  his  brow  and  until 
his  hair  begins  to  be  sprinkled  with  gray 
before  everybody  will  be  willing  to  trust 
him  in  therapeutics  and  surgery.  Luke 
had  served  his  apprenticeship  successfully, 
and  now  he  was  trusted  as  a  man  of  much 
experience,  as  well  as  of  adequate  pre- 
liminary training.  But  many  a  physician 
is  trusted  who  is  not  beloved.  Luke  was 
both  a  trusted  and  a  beloved  physician. 
He  must  have  had  a  sunny,  cheerful,  at- 
tractive disposition.  He  was  a  model  in 
this  respect  to  all  in  his  profession. 

The  medical  profession  was  born  among 
the  Greeks,  like  so  many  other  good 
things.  According  to  the  Greeks,  it  was 
divine  in  its  origin.  Apollo,  the  sun -god, 
was  the  healer  among  the  Greek  divinities. 
The  sun  is  the  great  healer  now.  The  sun 
bath  is  the  most  healthful  treatment,  not 
only  for  tuberculosis,  but  for  other  human 
ills.  The  Greeks  said  that  iEsculapius, 
the  first  physician,  was  the  son  of  Apollo, 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  25 

the  sun-god.  Every  physician  ought  to 
have  a  sunny  face  and  disposition.  A 
dyspeptic  doctor  is  worse  than  the  quinine 
he  gives.  A  sour  breath,  a  sour  face,  a 
cross  word  ought  all  of  them  to  be  on  the 
interdicted  list  with  him.  Luke  was  a 
Greek,  of  the  race  of  vEsculapius  and  Hip- 
pocrates. He  had  the  Greek  gift  of  a 
joyous  disposition,  a  pleasant  manner,  a 
lovable  personality.  He  was  the  beloved 
physician  because  of  his  personal  character. 
Paul  loved  him,  however,  not  only  be- 
cause he  was  a  trained  and  trusted  and 
agreeable  physician,  but  also  because  he 
was  a  Christian,  a  missionary,  an  evan- 
gelist. A  family  physician  need  be  second 
to  no  man  in  gaining  the  affections  of  those 
whom  he  serves.  A  Christian  physician 
can  get  at  the  hearts  of  those  whom  he 
serves  better  than  the  Christian  lawyer 
can,  or  the  Christian  business  man,  or  the 
Christian  minister.  One  need  have  no 
hesitancy  in  making  a  statement  of  that 
kind.  The  physician  comes  to  know  all 
the  secrets  of  the  household.    The  skeleton 


26  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

in  the  closet  may  be  hidden  very  easily 
from  the  minister,  the  business  man,  and 
even  from  the  lawyer;  but  the  physician  finds 
it  out,  and  as  he  keeps  these  secrets  of  his 
profession  sacred  he  comes  to  be  trusted 
and  honored  and  revered. 

In  the  sick-room,  in  the  crisis  moments 
of  the  disease,  in  the  hours  preceding  the 
final  death  struggle,  the  physician  finds  a 
leverage  power  for  the  preaching  of  the 
gospel  of  Christ  that  the  Sunday  pulpit 
has  never  known  and  that  cannot  be 
found  by  any  other  professional  man  in 
the  direct  line  of  his  professional  work. 
If  a  man  does  not  like  what  a  preacher 
says  in  his  pulpit  or  his  private  ministra- 
tions, he  can  get  up  and  go  away  and  he 
need  not  come  again  unless  he  desire  to  do 
so;  but  if  his  physician  choose  to  talk 
religion  to  him  on  his  sick-bed,  he  cannot 
get  up  and  go  away;  he  must  perforce  lie 
on  his  back  and  listen.  A  judicious  Chris- 
tian physician,  improving  every  favorable 
opportunity  to  speak  a  word  for  his  Master, 
may  be  the  most  successful  evangelist  in 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  27 

any  community.  We  have  known  the 
most  successful  and  the  most  trusted  and 
the  most  beloved  physician  in  a  given 
church  community  who  brought  more  peo- 
ple into  church  membership,  and  had  more 
converts  as  a  direct  result  of  his  personal 
labors  and  appeals,  than  the  preacher  had 
for  year  after  year  of  their  joint  ministry 
to  that  people.  That  was  an  exceptional 
case;  but  why  might  it  not  be  an  ordinary 
one  ? 

The  sick-room  may  become  a  sanctuary, 
devoted  to  serious  meditation  upon  reli- 
gious themes.  As  the  body  weakens  the 
soul  oftentimes  suddenly  expands.  It  be- 
comes insistent  that  its  claims  shall  be 
heard.  It  therefore  follows  that  the  phy- 
sician often  finds  that  ear  attentive  which 
has  been  deaf  to  the  appeal  of  the  pulpit, 
or  anything  that  may  have  been  said  on 
the  street  in  busy  healthful  life.  Luke  was 
both  a  physician  and  an  evangelist.  His 
praise  was  in  all  the  churches  for  his  good 
work  in  both  these  fields.  He  was  beloved 
for    his    medical    skill    and    for    his    ever- 


58  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

aggressive  and  ever-attractive  Christianity. 
He  might  well  be  a  model  for  all  in  the 
medical  profession.  There  is  a  Latin  stanza 
which  appraises  his  worth  in  this  twofold 
capacity  as  follows: 

Lucas,  Evangelii  et  medicinse  munera  pandens; 

Artibus  hinc,  illinc  religione,  valet: 
Utilis  ille  labor,  per  quern  vixere  tot  segri; 

Utilior,  per  quern  tot  didicere  mori!* 

V.  Luke,  the  Musician 
Have  we  now  the  complete  picture  of 
Luke  the  beloved  physician  as  far  as  the 
Scriptures  can  help  us  to  form  one  ?  Are 
there  any  other  personal  characteristics 
of  which  they  make  us  reasonably  sure  ? 
When  we  turn  to  Luke's  own  writings  I 
think  they  will  testify  to  at  least  one  more 
feature  of  Luke's  equipment  as  a  physician 
and  as  an  evangelist. 

He  was  a  man  who  was  fond  of  music. 
He  is  the  first  great  Christian  hymnologist. 
He  has  preserved  for  us  five  great  hymns 
of  the  early  church.  He  is  the  only  evan- 
gelist who  has  done  that.     His  gospel  nar- 

>Schaff,  op.  cit.,  p.  648. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  29 

rative  begins  with  hymns  and  ends  with 
praises.  Now,  music  and  medicine  always 
go  well  together  and  singing  and  salvation 
always  have  gone  hand  in  hand.  Music 
will  help  the  physician  to  drive  out  the 
devil  of  disease,  and  music  will  help  the 
evangelist  to  drive  out  the  devil  of  sin. 
The  devil  does  not  like  music,  and  villainy 
has  no  natural  affiliation  with  harmony. 
"The  righteous  doth  sing  and  rejoice."^ 

As  far  as  we  can  gather  from  any  good 
authoritj^  on  the  subject,  there  is  no  music 
in  hell.  The  Scriptures  surely  make  no 
mention  of  any.  There  is  weeping  there, 
and  wailing,  and  gnashing  of  teeth,  but 
not  a  single  song,  not  a  musical  note,  no 
concord,  no  harmony.  And  as  far  as  we 
can  gather  from  all  good  authorities  on  the 
subject,  when  the  old  things  have  passed 
away  and  all  things  have  become  new, 
music  will  find  its  eternal  home  in  heaven. 
There  are  harps  of  gold  and  songs  of  re- 
joicing, and  all  the  courts  of  the  king  will 
resound    forever    with    music    and    glad- 

i  Prov.  29.  6. 


30  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

ness  and  all  sorrow  and  sighing  will  flee 
away. 

We  remember  what  Shakespeare  has 
said: 

The  man  that  hath  no  music  in  himself. 
Nor  is  not  moved  with  concord  of  sweet  sounds, 
Is  fit  for  treasons,  stratagems,  and  spoils; 
The  motions  of  his  spirit  are  dull  as  night. 
And  his  affections  dark  as  Erebus: 
Let  no  such  man  be  trusted.* 

Such  a  man  must  be  a  villain,  like  "that 
spare  Cassius"  who  reads  much,  seldom 
smiles,  "hears  no  music."^ 

What  is  true  of  Shakespeare's  ideal  vil- 
lain is  true  of  villainy  incarnate,  the  Evil 
One,  as  well.  Burton  in  his  Anatomy  of 
Melancholy  not  only  prescribes  music  as  a 
sovereign  remedy  against  that  malady,  but 
in  the  same  breath  declares  that  it  is  a 
remedy  that  "will  drive  away  the  devil 
himself."  Luther  in  his  Table-Talk  is 
recorded  as  saying,  "The  devil  is  a  sa- 
turnine spirit,  and  music  is  hateful  to  him, 
and  drives  him  far  from  it."     The  Bible 


1  Merchant  of  Venice,  Act  v.  So.  1.  ^  Julius  Caesar,  Act  i.  Sc.  2. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  31 

bears  its  testimony  to  the  truthfulness  of 
the  statement.  When  the  three  kings  had 
made  Elisha  the  prophet  mad,  and  for  a 
moment  the  devil  had  taken  possession  of 
him,  he  cried,  "Bring  me  a  minstrel!"  and 
under  the  soothing  strains  of  the  min- 
strelsy his  rage  was  abated,  his  spirit  was 
calmed,  his  soul  was  uplifted  till  the  Spirit 
of  the  Lord  came  upon  him  and  he  broke 
out  into  the  prophecy  of  blessing.^  Music 
had  driven  the  devil  away. 

Messengers  went  from  Saul  the  monarch 
to  the  shepherd  lad  tending  his  flocks  out 
on  the  hills.  They  told  David,  "His 
Majesty  is  afflicted  beyond  measure;  at 
intervals  he  seems  to  be  devil-possessed; 
and  when  the  fury  seizes  him  neither 
physician  nor  priest  can  do  any  good;  and 
he  has  been  told  that  your  harp  would  help 
to  make  him  well."  So  David  went  to  the 
king's  relief;  and  it  came  to  pass  when  the 
evil  spirit  was  upon  Saul,  that  David  took 
an  harp  and  played  with  his  hand.  So 
Saul  was  refreshed  and  was  well  and  the 

1  2  Kings  3.  13-20. 


32  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

evil  spirit  departed  from  him.^  Secular 
history  furnishes  instances  of  a  similar  sort. 
Farinelli  sang  the  perturbed  spirit  out  of 
King  Philip  the  Fifth.  Charles  the  Great 
of  France  found  no  peace  of  soul  until 
Orlando  di  Lasso  brought  to  Paris  the 
music  that  exorcised  the  evil  spirit  within 
him. 

Walter  Scott  has  pictured  his  Highlander, 
Allan  McAulay,  whose  frenzy  was  often 
soothed  by  the  harp  of  Annot  Lyle.  In 
the  Cloister  and  the  Hearth,  Clement  be- 
thinks himself  in  his  despair  that  possibly 
King  Saul's  music  may  afford  him  some  re- 
lief, but  he  conceives  his  case  most  des- 
perate. "Saul  had  a  saint  to  play  to  him. 
He  was  not  alone  with  the  spirits  of  dark- 
ness; but  here  is  no  sweet  bard  of  Israel 
to  play  to  me:  I,  lonely,  with  crushed 
heart,  on  which  a  black  fiend  sitteth, 
mountain-high,  must  make  the  music  to 
uplift  that  heart  to  heaven."  Could  it  be 
hoped  that  music  would  accomplish  such 
a  task  ?    Hear  how  Robert  Browning  sings : 

1 1  Sam.  16.  14-23. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  33 

My  heart!  they  loose  my  heart,  those  simple  words; 
Its  darkness  passes,  which  naught  else  could  touch. 
Like  some  dank  snake  that  force  may  not  expel. 
Which  glideth  out  to  music  sweet  and  low. 

It  was  an  ancient  fable  that  the  music 
of  Orpheus  could  subdue  the  wildest  of 
the  beasts  and  could  draw  after  him  even 
the  trees  and  the  stones  and  the  floods; 
but  to  music  has  been  given  this  greater 
power  over  the  snake  and  over  that  old 
serpent,  the  devil.  When  he  had  taken 
possession  of  earth  God  sent  Music,  his 
angel  of  mercy,  to  keep  alive  in  man's 
heart  the  memory  of  heaven's  harmony 
and  to  shield  him  from  Satan's  severest 
assaults. 

There  is  no  harmony  in  hell;  that  helps 
to  make  it  what  it  is.  The  devil  hates 
music;  that  is  part  of  his  curse.  The 
snake  never  sings;  neither  does  the  vulture; 
nor  any  bird  or  beast  of  prey.  Neither 
does  the  burglar,  nor  murderer,  nor  the 
villainous  among  men.  It  is  only  the 
happy  and  the  innocent,  the  lark  and  the  lin- 
net: it  is  the  righteous  who  sing  and  rejoice. 


S4  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

The  Old  Testament  was  full  of  singing 
and  it  has  a  hymn  book  in  its  heart.  Luke 
believed  that  those  Old  Testament  hymns 
could  be  adapted  to  Christian  uses.  He 
carries  the  hymnology  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment church  over  into  the  New.  He  is 
the  father  and  the  founder  of  Christian 
hymnology.    Bishop  Keble  says  of  Luke: 

Thou  hast  an  ear  for  angel  songs, 
A  breath  the  gospel  trump  to  fill. 

And  taught  by  thee  the  church  prolongs. 
Her  hymns  of  high  thanksgiving  still. 

He  shows  us  how  the  very  beginning  of 
the  Christian  era  was  ushered  in  with 
songs,  and  how  the  Christian  Church  sang 
its  way  through  its  earliest  triumphs. 
When  Paul  and  Silas  had  been  cast  into 
the  inner  prison  and  their  feet  were  made 
fast  in  the  stocks,  at  midnight  they  sang 
praises  unto  God  until  an  earthquake 
opened  their  prison  doors  and  everyone's 
bands  were  loosed.  I  have  often  won- 
dered if  those  hymns  which  Paul  and  Silas 
sang  were  not  composed  by  Luke.  Tim- 
othy and  Luke  were  with  Paul  and  Silas 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  35 

there  at  Philippl.  They  may  have  been 
keeping  their  midnight  vigil  just  outside 
the  prison  walls,  and  when  they  heard  the 
prisoners  singing  some  of  Luke's  gospel 
hymns  they  knew  that  imprisonment  had 
not  daunted  the  spirits  of  those  apostles 
of  God's  grace. 

They  were  like  David,  who  was  a  hunted 
outlaw,  and  had  to  hide  himself  in  dens 
and  caves  of  the  earth,  and  who  yet  sang 
psalms  and  rejoiced.  They  were  like 
David's  greater  Son,  who  had  finished  his 
last  supper  with  his  disciples  and  was 
facing  toward  betrayal  and  denial  and 
death,  and  who  yet  sang  a  hymn  with 
them  before  they  went  out  to  Gethsemane. 
They  were  like  Paul  Gerhardt,  who  while 
in  deep  distress  composed  that  famous 
song  beginning, 

Give  to  the  winds  thy  fears, 

Hope  and  be  undismayed. 

They  were  like  Martin  Luther,  who  had 
heard  bad  news,  very  bad  news,  and  who 
said,  "Come,  let  us  sing  a  psalm,  and 
spite  the  devil." 


36  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

They  were  like  Bunyan's  Pilgrim,  who 
sang  at  the  very  beginning  of  his  pil- 
grimage toward  the  Celestial  City,  sang 
upon  the  Hill  of  Difficulty,  sang  in  the 
Chamber  of  Peace,  sang  after  his  duel  with 
Apollyon,  and  sang  after  his  sight  of  the 
Delectable  Mountains.  They  were  like 
those  pilgrims  in  the  second  part  of  Pil- 
grim's Progress  who  broke  out  into  singing 
and  so  went  on  into  the  Land  of  Beulah, 
where  the  sun  shineth  evermore.  They 
believed  that  the  best  way  to  get  ready  for 
heaven  was  to  have  psalms  and  hymns  and 
spiritual  songs  filling  their  hearts  all  their 
time  on  earth.  They  believed  that  music 
and  song  were  divine  gifts  and  the  Chris- 
tian's peculiar  heritage. 

We  believe  that  Luke  was  personally  and 
largely  influential  in  fastening  this  faith  on 
the  Christian  Church.  He  had  the  Greek 
love  for  melody.  He  was  full  of  music 
hiriiself.  He  collected  and  recorded  the 
first  Christian  hymns.  He  gave  Paul 
medicine  when  he  needed  it,  and  when  all 
medicines  had  failed,  like  another  David 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  37 

before  another  Saul,  he  ministered  to  him 
in  melody  until  his  physical  ills  and  his 
spiritual  wounds  were  all  healed.  He  must 
have  been  a  versatile  genius,  this  man 
Luke,  ready  to  serve  and  able  to  serve 
according  to  any  man's  need.  No  wonder 
that  he  was  beloved  by  all,  and  his  praise 
was  in  all  the  churches. 

VI.  Luke,  the  Artist 

From  church  tradition  we  may  add 
another  accomplishment  to  this  many- 
sided  man.  Dante  Gabriel  Rossetti  has 
put  this  church  tradition  into  his  lines: 

Give  honor  unto  Luke,  evangelist, 

For  he  it  was,  the  ancient  legends  say, 

Who  first  taught  Art  to  fold  her  hands  and  pray.* 

Luke  was  said  to  have  painted  the  portrait 
of  the  Virgin.^  The  oldest  witness  to  this 
fact  is  Theodorus  Lector,  who  was  reader 
in  the  Church  of  Constantinople  in  the 
sixth  century.  He  tells  us  that  the  Em- 
press Eudoxia  found  at  Jerusalem  a  picture 

1  Sonnet  Ixsiv.     In  the  House  of  Life. 

»  Plummer,  International  Critical  Commentary  on  Luke,  p.  xxii. 


38  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

of  the  God-Mother  painted  by  Luke  the 
apostle  and  she  presented  it  to  her 
daughter,  Pulcheria,  the  wife  of  Theo- 
dosius  II.  In  the  Capella  PaoHna,  in  the 
Church  of  Santa  Maria  Maggiore,  at 
Rome,  a  very  ancient  picture  is  preserved, 
a  portrait  of  the  Virgin  ascribed  to  Luke. 
It  can  be  traced  back  to  A.  D.  847,  and  it 
may  be  much  older  than  that. 

In  the  catacombs  there  is  an  inscription 
referring  to  a  rude  painting  of  the  Virgin 
as  "one  of  seven  painted  by  Luca."  This 
inscription  may  be  the  source  of  the  later 
traditions.  Or  they  may  all  have  sprung 
from  the  fact  that,  as  Plummer  says: 
*'Luke  has  had  a  great  Influence  upon 
Christian  art,  of  which  in  a  real  sense  he 
may  be  called  the  founder.  'The  Shepherd 
with  the  Lost  Sheep  on  His  Shoulder,'  one 
of  the  earliest  representations  of  Christ, 
comes  from  Luke  15;  and  both  mediaeval 
and  modern  artists  have  been  specially 
fond  of  representing  those  scenes  which  are 
described  by  Luke  alone:  the  annunciation, 
the  visit  of  Mary  to  Elisabeth,  the  shep- 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  39 

herds,  the  manger,  the  presentation  in  the 
temple,  Simeon  and  Anna,  Christ  with  the 
doctors,  the  woman  at  the  supper  of 
Simon  the  Pharisee,  Christ  weeping  over 
Jerusalem,  the  walk  to  Emmaus,  the  good 
Samaritan,  the  prodigal  son.  Many  other 
scenes  which  are  favorites  with  painters 
might  be  added  from  the  Acts."^  Luke,  says 
Philip  Schaff,  "is  the  painter  of  Christus 
Sal va tor  and  Christus  Consolator."^ 

He  may  not  have  been  an  artist  with  his 
brush,  but  we  know  that  he  was  an  artist 
with  his  pen.  He  composed  a  book  which 
a  competent  critic  declares  to  be  the  most 
beautiful  book  ever  written.  In  it  he  has 
portrayed  the  Virgin  Mary  and  her  Sinless 
Son  and  many  other  characters  most  beau- 
tiful and  rare.  He  had  an  artist's  soul.  He 
loved  the  good  and  beautiful  and  true. 
He  may  have  used  the  artist's  tools.  It 
would  make  him  a  very  versatile  genius 
indeed,  if  he  were  a  competent  physician 
and  an  accomplished  musician  and  a 
painter  of  pictures  besides.     But  we  have 

1  Plummer,  op.  cit.,  p.  xxij.        *  SchafI,  op.  cit,  p.  660. 


40  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUT. 

known  just  such  versatile  men  again  and 
again  in  the  course  of  the  centuries.  Luke 
may  have  been  one  of  them.  We  know 
that  he  was  an  extraordinary  man  in 
many  respects;  and  we  know  that  if  he 
never  put  any  portraits  on  canvas,  he  has 
put  them  on  his  written  page  with  such 
artistic  excellence  that  he  may  safely  be 
said  to  be  the  founder  of  Christian  art. 

VII.  Luke,  the  Gentile 

We  have  suggested  that  Luke  was  in  all 
probability  a  Gentile.  Our  reasons  for  so 
concluding  are  not  absolutely  compelling 
ones.  They  seem  to  establish  the  dominant 
probability  in  the  case.  They  are  as 
follows:  1.  Luke's  name  is  Greek. 

2.  His  style  is  more  like  that  of  a  Greek 
than  a  Jew.  Philip  Schaff  declares  that  his 
writing  is  admirably  suited  to  the  Greek 
taste,  and  that  the  prologue  to  the  Gospel 
would  at  once  captivate  the  refined  Hel- 
lenic ear  by  its  classic  construction.  He 
compares  it  with  the  prologues  of  Hero- 
dotus and  Thucydides  and  concludes  that 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  41 

Luke's  prologue  is  unsurpassed  for  brevity, 
modesty,  and  dignity.^  Of  no  other  writer 
in  the  New  Testament  could  such  state- 
ments be  made;  and  the  easy  conclusion  is 
that  Luke  could  write  so  much  better 
Greek  because  he  was  himself  a  Greek. 

3.  In  Col.  4.  10-14  Paul  sends  the  saluta- 
tions of  Aristarchus,  Mark,  and  Jesus  Jus- 
tus to  the  Colossians;  and  he  says  of  them, 
* 'These  are  of  the  circumcision."  Then 
he  goes  on  to  send  the  salutations  of 
Epaphras,  Luke,  and  Demas,  as  if  these 
were  not  included  among  those  of  the 
circumcision  whose  salutations  he  sent  first. 
If  we  could  be  sure  that  there  was  an  in- 
tentional distinction  here,  as  there  cer- 
tainly seems  to  be,  it  would  settle  the 
matter  that  Luke  was  indeed  a  Gentile  by 
birth.  If  we  so  conclude,  we  have  in  Luke 
the  only  Gentile  among  the  writers  of  the 
New  Testament  books.  It  would  be  inter- 
esting if  we  could  decide  not  only  that 
Luke  was  a  Gentile,  but  also  to  what  part 
of  the  Gentile  world  he  belonged. 


1  Schaff,  op.  cil.,  pp.  656,  664. 


42  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

VIII.  Luke,  of  Antioch 
All  indications  seem  to  point  to  Antioch 
of  Syria  as  his  home.     We  list  a  few  of 
these:  1.  Eusebius^  says  that  Luke  belonged 
to  an  Antiochian  family. 

2.  Jerome^  tells  us  explicitly  that  Luke 
was  a  physician  of  Antioch,  and  a  preface 
to  the  Gospel,  written,  as  Harnack  thinks, 
in  the  third  century,  says  that  Luke  was  by 
nation  a  Syrian  of  Antioch. 

3.  In  the  book  of  Acts  Luke  names  the 
seven  deacons  appointed  over  the  church  of 
Jerusalem  and  locates  only  one  of  them, 
and  he  is  "Nicolas  of  Antioch."^  Why  was 
Nicolas  given  this  location  .^^  Was  it  be- 
cause Luke  had  known  him  at  Antioch  and 
was  proud  of  the  fact  that  one  of  his  fel- 
low citizens  had  been  appointed  to  such 
an  oflBce,  and  therefore  considered  it  well 
worth  his  recording  ?  James  Smith  points 
out  the  coincidence  that  of  eight  accounts 
of  the  Russian  campaign  of  1812,  three 
written  by  Frenchmen  and  three  written  by 
Englishmen   never  mention  the  fact  that 

>  Eccleaiastical  History,  iii,  4,  7.     '  De  Viria  lUustribus,  vii.      '  Acts  6.  5. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  43 

the  Russian  General  Barclay  de  Tolly  was 
of  Scotch  extraction;  but  the  two  accounts 
of  that  campaign  written  by  the  two 
Scotchmen,  Scott  and  Alison,  both  men- 
tion it.  It  was  of  more  importance  to 
them;  at  least  it  was  of  sufficient  im- 
portance to  seem  to  them  to  be  well  worth 
chronicling. 

4.  Luke  seems  to  be  well  acquainted  with 
the  history  of  the  church  at  Antioch  and 
gives  us  an  unusually  full  account  of  its 
pastors  and  teachers  and  their  enterprises 
and  their  trials.  He  makes  the  church  at 
Antioch  the  mother  of  all  the  Gentile 
churches;  and  he  says  that  the  Christians 
were  first  called  by  that  name  in  Antioch. 
Luke  seems  to  be  well  acquainted  with  all 
the  controversies  in  the  church  in  this 
city.  It  is  to  Antioch  that  Barnabas 
summons  Saul,  and  in  their  labors  together 
in  the  synagogues  of  Antioch  they  are  made 
ready  for  their  advance  upon  the  Gentile 
world.  It  is  from  Antioch  that  Barnabas 
and  Saul  are  sent  forth  to  their  great  mis^ 
sionary  campaigns;  and  it  is  to  Antioch 


44  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

that  they  return  to  make  their  reports. 
Such  records  as  we  find  in  Acts  11.  19-30, 
and  13.  1-3,  and  15.  1-3,  30-40  lead  us  to 
suppose  that  Luke  must  have  been  resi- 
dent in  Antioch  and  that  he  was  personally 
acquainted  with  the  events  which  he  has 
narrated  at  such  comparatively  unusual 
length. 

5.  There  is  a  reading  peculiar  to  Codex 
Bezse,  which  was  known  to  Augustine,  and 
which  was  accepted  by  him  as  genuine 
and  of  good  authority,  and  which  would  go 
far  to  settle  this  probability  of  Luke's 
residence  in  Antioch  if  we  adopted  it,  for 
it  would  represent  the  first  occurrence  of 
the  pronoun  "we"  in  the  narrative  and 
would  locate  the  narrator  in  Antioch.  After 
Acts  11.  27,  which  reads,  "Now  in  these 
days  there  came  down  prophets  from  Jeru- 
salem unto  Antioch,"  Codex  Bezse  has  the 
following  statement:  "And  there  was  great 
rejoicing;  and  when  we  were  gathered  to- 
gether one  of  them  named  Agabus  stood 
up,"  and  so  on.  According  to  this  reading, 
Luke  was  a  member  of  the  church  at  An- 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  45 

tioch  at  this  time.  If  so,  Luke  was  prob- 
ably among  the  very  first  Gentile  converts 
to  Christianity  in  Antioch.  It  may  have 
been  the  preaching  or  the  personal  influence 
of  his  former  school  friend,  Saul,  that 
brought  him  into  the  Christian  Church. 
At  any  rate,  their  association  in  Christian 
work  would  have  begun  at  this  time  and 
place. 

6.  There  is  still  another  indication  of 
Luke's  connection  with  Antioch.  He  dedi- 
cates both  his  books  to  the  "most  hon- 
orable Theophilus."  Now,  the  Clemen- 
tines tell  us  that  Theophilus  was  a  wealthy 
citizen  of  Antioch.  He  probably  held  some 
official  position  there.  The  title  which 
Luke  gives  him  is  the  title  given  to  the 
governors  Felix  and  Festus  in  the  book  of 
Acts,^  and  it  may  be  reserved  for  those 
who  are  employed  in  the  government 
service,  and  for  these  alone.  Then  the 
better  translation  of  the  title  would  be, 
"most  honorable"  or  "most  noble."  This 
Theophilus    was    a    wealthy    man    and    a 

»  Acta  23.  26;  24.  3;  26.  25. 


46  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Christian  man,  and  it  may  be  that  he  was 
Luke's  literary  patron  and  furnished  him 
the  leisure  and  the  financial  backing  neces- 
sary for  the  publication  of  his  two  volumes 
of  history. 

IX.  Luke,  the  Freedman 

T  Some  have  thought  that  Luke  was  a 
freedman.  The  reasons  suggested  for  such 
a  conclusion  are:  1.  It  was  a  custom  among 
both  the  Greeks  and  the  Romans  to  educate 
some  one  of  their  domestic  slaves  in  the 
medical  profession,  and  if  he  proved  ex- 
pert in  it,  it  was  not  an  unusual  thing  for 
them  to  grant  him  his  freedom  in  return 
for  his  services.  A  large  number  of  the 
physicians  of  that  day  are  said  to  have 
belonged  to  this  class. 

2.  Such  names  as  Luke's,  contractions  in 
as,  as  "Lucas"  for  "Lucanus,"  we  are  told, 
were  peculiarly  common  in  the  names  of 
slaves.  Luke  was  a  man  of  broad  sym- 
pathies for  all  the  down-trodden  and  the 
poor,  as  his  writings  well  show.  Did  he 
learn  this  sympathy  for  all  the  wretched 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  47 

ones  when  he  was  a  slave,  and  in  all  his 
after  life  of  freedom  did  he  never  lose  his 
memory  of  their  need  ?  And  was  it  there- 
fore one  of  his  chief  delights  in  the  gospel 
that  in  his  conception  of  it  its  first  and 
chief  mission  was  to  preach  good  tidings  to 
the  poor,  to  proclaim  release  to  the  cap- 
tives, and  to  set  at  liberty  them  that  are 
bruised?^ 

If  Luke  began  life  as  a  slave,  he  must 
have  made  the  most  of  all  the  opportuni- 
ties offered  him,  and  very  early  in  life  he 
must  have  proved  himself  worthy  of  free- 
dom; and  in  his  later  life,  with  his  scientific 
and  professional  training,  he  was  a  worthy 
and  beloved  associate  of  those  other  uni- 
versity graduates,  Paul  and  Apollos,  and 
possibly  Barnabas.  Of  all  the  first 
preachers  of  the  gospel  these  alone  would 
seem  to  have  had  the  advantages  of  the 
schools,  and  most  naturally  they  drifted 
together  and  found  the  greatest  pleasure  in 
each  other's  congenial  companionship.  Col- 
lege men  are  birds  of  a  feather,  and,  unless 

1  Luke  4.  18. 


48  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

there  be  some  personal  reason  to  the  con- 
trary, they  are  sure  to  flock  together;  and 
if  they  do  so,  their  service  to  any  cause 
they  may  espouse  is  usually  found  to  be 
the  most  efficient  service  it  can  muster. 

Barnabas  was  the  great  reconciler  in  the 
infant  church.  Apollos  was  the  great  ora- 
tor; and  if  he  wrote  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews,  he  added  the  finest  literary  com- 
position to  the  books  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment. Paul  was  the  church  organizer  and 
pioneer  missionary  and  systematic  theolo- 
gian without  a  peer.  Luke  was  the  author 
of  the  most  beautiful  book  ever  written 
and  the  incomparable  historian  of  the  early 
church.  It  would  seem  that  Christianity 
could  not  have  gotten  along  very  well  in 
the  beginning  without  these  four  college 
men,  as  it  has  not  been  able  to  get  along 
very  well  at  any  time  since  without  the 
leadership  of  men  of  the  highest  education. 
Three  of  these  men,  Barnabas,  Paul,  and 
Luke,  possibly  met  each  other  for  the  first 
time  in  the  University  of  Tarsus;  and  their 
friendship  formed  in  college  may  have  had 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  49 

much  to  do  with  the  shaping  of  their  future 
lives.  Apollos  came  from  the  rival  school 
at  Alexandria;  but  when  he  became  a 
Christian  he  was  admitted  to  their  circle 
without  question  as  a  man  of  culture  and 
refinement,  and  therefore  sure  to  furnish 
serviceable  and  congenial  companionship. 

X.  Luke  in  Later  Tradition 

The  later  church  traditions  concerning 
Luke  do  not  date  farther  back  than  the 
fourth  century,  A.  D.  Epiphanius  tells  us 
that  after  Paul's  death  Luke  preached  in 
Italy  and  in  Gaul  and  in  Dalmatia  and  in 
Macedonia.^  We  are  told  that  he  lived  to 
the  age  of  eighty-four.  One  account  says 
that  he  was  finally  crucified  in  the  Pelo- 
ponnesus, at  Elesea,  on  an  olive  tree. 
Another  account  says  that  he  died  a 
natural  death  in  Bithynia.  Later  we  read 
that  his  bones  were  brought  from  Patras 
in  Achaia  by  the  order  of  the  emperor 
Constantine  and  were  buried  in  the  Church 
of  the  Apostles  in  Constantinople. 

1  Haer.  51, 


50  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

XI.  An  Outline  Biography 
We  have  now  before  us  all  the  facts  and 
all  the  inferences  and  traditions  out  of 
which  it  might  be  possible  to  construct  an 
ideal  biography  of  the  evangelist  Luke. 
Shall  we  make  the  attempt  to  outline  his 
career  upon  the  basis  of  these  ? 

1.  He  was  born  a  slave  boy  in  the  house- 
hold of  Theophilus,  a  wealthy  government 
official  in  Antioch.  He  grew  up  into  most 
engaging  appearance  and  most  attractive 
personality.  He  was  of  a  peculiarly  acute 
intellect  and  of  a  most  obliging  disposition. 
He  won  his  master's  confidence  and  then 
his  personal  liking.  Theophilus  decided  to 
educate  the  boy  at  his  own  expense  and  at 
the  best  university  in  the  land.  So  it  was 
that  the  second  capital  event  in  the  life  of 
Luke  was  his  matriculation  at  Tarsus. 

2.  Here  he  studied  medicine,  where  the 
great  masters  in  that  profession,  Aretseus, 
Dioscorides,  and  Athenseus,  had  been  edu- 
cated. Just  a  few  miles  away  at  JEg^ 
stood  the  great  Temple  of  iEsculapius, 
which  furnished  the  nearest  approach  to 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  51 

the  modern  hospital  to  be  found  in  the 
ancient  world.  From  the  university  lec- 
tures Luke  got  the  theory  of  medicine;  in 
the  Temple  of  iEsculapius  he  got  the 
practice  and  experience  he  needed.  He 
made  the  acquaintance  of  Barnabas  and 
Saul  here,  and  laid  the  foundations  for  a 
lifelong  friendship  with  these  men. 

3.  His  education  completed,  he  returned 
to  Antioch  and  rendered  faithful  and  most 
successful  service  in  his  master's  family. 
Then  the  gospel  was  preached  at  Antioch, 
and  Luke  was  among  the  first  to  hear  it  and 
to  accept  it.  He  told  his  master,  Theo- 
philus,  about  it,  and  Theophilus  himself 
became  interested  and  at  last  converted. 
Then  about  the  first  thing  Theophilus  did 
as  a  Christian  was  to  give  Luke  his 
freedom. 

4.  The  first  impulse  of  the  freedman 
Luke  was  to  get  away  from  all  the  scenes 
of  his  servitude  and  to  test  his  new-found 
liberty  by  wandering  far  and  wide  at  his 
own  sweet  will.  He  shipped  as  a  physician 
upon  one  of  the  vessels  plying  up  and  down 


52  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

the  Mediterranean,  and  there  he  had  mani- 
fold experiences.  His  outlook  was  broad- 
ened as  he  saw  more  of  the  world.  He  was 
of  service  to  many  people  and  he  made 
many  friends. 

5.  On  one  of  his  voyages  he  met  some 
members  of  the  family  of  Lucanus,  the 
poet,  and  they  persuaded  him  to  accom- 
pany them  to  their  home  in  Corduba  in 
Spain.  Luke  was  there  when  the  poet  was 
born,  and  the  baby  boy  was  named  after 
him.  In  this  household  he  became  ac- 
quainted with  Gallio  and  Seneca  and  many 
other  notable  men.  The  slave  boy  had 
risen  to  a  considerable  height,  for  his 
natural  ability  and  his  excellent  education 
and  his  goodness  of  heart  enabled  him  to 
converse  with  the  best  of  men  as  their 
equal,  and  as  a  freedman  and  physician  he 
was  admitted  to  terms  of  intimacy  which 
otherwise  would  have  been  impossible. 

6.  In  due  time  he  came  back  to  Antioch 
and  was  resident  there  when  many  of  the 
stirring  events  which  he  narrates  in  the 
history  of  its  Christian  Church  took  place. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  53 

7.  Later  he  removed  to  Troas  and  set- 
tled there,  where  Paul  found  him  on  his 
second  missionary  journey.  He  went  with 
Paul  to  Philippi,  and  was  left  in  charge  of 
that  church  for  seven  years. 

8.  He  left  Philippi  with  Paul  in  A.  D.  58, 
and  remained  with  Paul  thereafter  until 
the  apostle's  martj^rdom. 

9.  Some  time  after  this  event  he  wrote 
the  third  Gospel  and  the  book  of  Acts  for 
Theophilus,  and  he  fully  intended  to  write 
a  third  volume  continuing  the  historj^  but 
he  was  swept  away  into  the  tide  of  Chris- 
tian evangelism  and  never  found  the  leisure 
to  do  it. 

10.  He  labored  as  an  evangelist  in  many 
lands,  and  in  a  ripe  old  age  he  fell  on  sleep 
and  was  buried  somewhere  in  Greece. 

11.  Luke  was  one  of  the  most  respected 
and  best-beloved  members  of  the  early 
church.  His  praise  was  in  all  the  churches. 
All  women  liked  him  and  all  men  honored 
him.  Apollos  and  he  were  the  most  ac- 
complished writers,  and  Paul  and  he  were 
the  most  prolific  writers  of  the  New  Tes- 


54  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

lament  times.  Take  the  writings  of  Luke 
and  Paul  out  of  the  New  Testament  and 
it  would  be  less  than  half  its  present  size; 
and  of  the  larger  half  of  the  present  con- 
tents of  the  New  Testament  Luke  wrote 
more  than  Paul.  He  was  a  most  versa- 
tile man — a  physician,  a  musician,  a  painter, 
a  poet,  a  preacher,  a  prolific  author,  an 
intrepid  missionary — a  man  with  many 
gifts  and  many  friends  and  manifold  ac- 
complishment. His  biography  was  a  ro- 
mance. His  books  are  invaluable.  Both 
he  and  they  are  worth  our  knowing  and 
knowing  well. 


PART  TWO:  THE  GOSPEL 


55 


THE  GOSPEL 

I.  Sources  of  the  Gospel 

Luke  was  not  an  eyewitness  of  the 
events  in  the  gospel  history.  Where  did 
he  get  his  information  concerning  these 
things  he  has  recorded  ?  We  turn  to  the 
beginning  words  of  the  Gospel  to  find  what 
he  himself  'has  to  say  about  it.  He  tells  us 
that  he  wrote  of  his  own  accord,  and  the 
only  credential  he  presents  for  the  trust- 
worthiness of  his  narrative  is  that  of 
painstaking  investigation  of  all  the  sources 
of  information  at  his  command.  He  certi- 
fies, however,  that  the  result  of  this  in- 
vestigation is  a  fuller,  more  accurate,  and 
more  orderly  account  of  the  life  of  Jesus 
than  any  of  which  he  knew. 

He  divides  the  chief  sources  of  the  facts 

he  has  written  into  documentary  material 

and  oral  testimony.    There  had  been  many 

57 


58  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

attempts  at  narrative  of  which  in  their 
manuscript  form  he  was  able  to  avail  him- 
self and  upon  which  he  hoped  to  improve. 
There  were  also  many  eyewitnesses  still 
living  whom  he  was  able  to  interview  and 
who  delivered  to  him  their  first-hand  in- 
formation concerning  many  things.  Upon 
the  basis  of  his  documents  and  the  careful 
recording  of  apostolic  tradition  as  given  to 
himself  Luke  assures  Theophilus  that  he 
may  rely  upon  the  certainty  of  the  things 
he  here  finds  recorded.^  1.  We  ask,  What 
were  Luke's  documents  ? 

We  think  we  can  distinguish  a  few  of 
them.  (1)  After  the  introduction  explain- 
ing the  authority  and  the  aims  of  the  book, 
the  first  two  chapters  of  the  third  Gospel 
are  full  of  Hebraic  expressions  and  differ 
so  widely  in  style  and  general  charactei 
from  the  remainder  of  the  Gospel  that 
almost  all  scholars  have  concluded  that 
they  are  translations  from  the  Aramaic, 
and  probably  represent  two  or  three 
written   sources.     We  may  find  the  con- 

iLuke  1.  1-4. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  59 

elusions  of  these  fragments  at  1.  80;  2.  40; 
and  2.  52. 

(2)  The  genealogy  in  3.  23-38  must 
have  been  taken,  of  course,  from  some 
legal  or  tribal  or  temple  document. 

(3)  It  does  not  seem  probable  that  Luke 
was  acquainted  with  our  Gospel  according 
to  Matthew  either  in  the  Greek  or  in  the 
Hebrew.  It  is  possible  that  he  did  not 
know  the  Gospel  according  to  Mark  in  its 
present  form.  We  know,  however,  that 
Mark  was  at  Rome  with  Paul  in  A.  D.  64, 
according  to  Col.  4.  10  and  Philem.  24. 
We  know,  further,  that  Luke  was  there  at 
the  same  time.^  When  we  notice,  there- 
fore, that  there  are  certain  portions  of 
Luke's  narrative  which  are  paralleled  in 
Mark's  account  and  which  are  not  to  be 
found  in  the  Gospel  according  to  Matthew, 
the  most  natural  and  adequate  explana- 
tion of  these  parallels  between  Mark  and 
Luke  would  be  found  in  the  personal 
association  of  these  two  men  at  Rome, 
where  they  could  compare  notes  of  ma- 

'  Col.  4.  14. 


60  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

terial  already  collected.  Of  these  passages 
in  Luke,  not  to  be  found  in  Matthew,  but 
paralleled  in  Mark  and  possibly  derived 
from  manuscript  notes  made  by  Mark 
himself,  we  may  mention  the  story  of  the 
demoniac  healed  in  the  synagogue  on  the 
Sabbath,^  the  journey  through  Galilee,-  the 
prayer  of  the  demoniac,^  the  complaint  of 
John  against  the  man  who  would  not 
follow  with  them,  but  who  would  persist 
in  casting  out  devils,  nevertheless,^  and 
the  women  bringing  spices  to  the 
sepulcher.^ 

2.  Among  the  eyewitnesses  and  minis- 
ters of  the  Word  from  whom  Luke  could 
have  obtained  some  information  we  may 
be  sure  of  some,  at  least.  (1)  As  a  physi- 
cian Luke  would  come  into  confidential 
relations  with  many  women,  and  as  the 
women  who  ministered  to  Jesus  and  had 
had  personal  experiences  with  him  during 
the  course  of  his  ministry  came  to  know 
Luke  and  to  like  him  and  trust  him  they 
could  tell  him  some  of  these  things  con- 

»  Luke  4.  33-37.         2  4.  43,  44.  a  8.  38.  *  9.  49.  «  24.  1. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  61 

cerning  women  and  their  relation  to  Jesus 
which  Luke  alone  has  preserved  for  us. 
Such  facts  as  we  find  in  Luke  7.  36-50; 
8.  2,  3;  10.  38-42;  11.  27;  23.  27-29,  49,  56 
must  have  come  from  the  women 
themselves. 

(2)  Luke  seems  to  have  had  some  special 
source  of  information  concerning  matters 
pertaining  to  the  court  of  Herod.  The 
information  given  us  in  such  passages  as 
8.  3;  13.  32;  23.  5-12  is  to  be  found  in 
Luke's  narrative  alone.  We  read  in  Acts 
13.  1  that  Paul  and  his  companions,  among 
whom  Luke  may  have  been  one,  were 
associated  with  Manaen,  the  foster  brother 
of  Herod.  It  is  easy  to  conclude  that  all 
inside  information  concerning  Herod  and 
his  court  came  to  Paul  or  to  Luke  through 
him. 

(3)  In  Acts  21.  16  we  are  told  that  Luke 
lodged  while  at  Jerusalem  with  Mnason  of 
Cyprus,  who  had  been  a  disciple  from  the 
beginning.  Here,  then,  was  another  who 
could  give  him  original  information  con- 
cerning many  things. 


62  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

(4)  There  must  have  been  many  other 
early  disciples  whom  Luke  met  at  various 
times.  He  may  have  met  Peter  and  Barna- 
bas at  Antioch.  He  would  surely  meet 
James  and  the  elders  of  the  church  when 
he  came  with  Paul  to  Jerusalem. 

(5)  During  the  two  years  of  Paul's  im- 
prisonment in  Csesarea  Luke  became  ac- 
quainted with  Philip  the  evangelist  and 
his  daughters.  All  they  knew  as  to  the 
facts  of  Christ's  life  they  would  gladly 
share  with  Luke. 

(6)  At  Csesarea  Luke  was  only  fifty  miles 
from  Jerusalem,  and  there  was  a  good 
road  between  the  two  cities;  and  he  was 
only  two  days'  journey  from  the  shores  of 
Lake  Gennesaret.  A  man  bent  upon  trac- 
ing accurately  from  the  first  the  course  of 
events  in  the  life  of  the  Lord  hardly  could 
have  failed  to  visit  these  places,  and,  ex- 
ploring among  them  and  on  into  Persea, 
Luke  could  have  picked  up  such  items  of 
information  as  we  find  in  7.  11-17;  24. 
13-35  and  many  things  in  the  Persean  minis- 
try which  we  find  recorded  nowhere  else. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  63 

We  do  not  know  what  Luke  was  doing 
during  the  two  years  of  Paul's  imprison- 
ment at  Csesarea,  but  we  may  be  sure 
that  he  was  employing  his  time  well;  and 
what  more  congenial  employment  could  he 
have  found  than  the  gathering  of  materials 
for  a  narrative  of  the  things  which  had 
been  fulfilled  in  that  vicinity  in  the  found- 
ing of  the  Christian  Church  ?  He  could 
interview  any  number  of  eyewitnesses  and 
he  could  trace  the  course  of  all  things  ac- 
curately from  the  first  in  personal  investi- 
gation.    Did  he  write  the  Gospel  at  this 

time  ? 

II.  Date  of  the  Gospel 

There  are  those  who  think  that  Luke 
must  have  written  the  third  Gospel  either 
during  Paul's  imprisonment  at  Csesarea  or 
the  immediately  succeeding  imprisonment 
at  Rome.  The  following  authorities  agree 
that  the  narrative  as  we  have  it  was 
written  before  or  about  A.  D,  63:  Alford, 
Ebrard,  Farrar,  Gloag,  Godet,  Hofmann, 
Hug,  Keil,  Lange,  Lumby,  Schaff,  Tholuck, 
Wieseler,   and  others.     They  say:   1.  The 


64  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Gospel  according  to  Luke  must  have  been 
written  before  the  book  of  Acts,  and  the 
book  of  Acts  does  not  say  anything  about 
the  death  of  Paul,  and  the  close  of  its  nar- 
native  seems  to  coincide  with  the  date  of 
Luke's  writing.  Therefore  both  the  Gospel 
and  the  book  of  Acts  were  written  before 
the  date  of  Paul's  martyrdom.  2.  When 
Luke  tells  us  about  the  prophecy  of  the 
famine  made  by  Agabus  in  Acts  11.  28  he 
is  careful  to  add  that  the  prophecy  was 
fulfilled  in  the  days  of  Claudius;  but  when 
he  tells  us  about  the  prophecy  of  the  de- 
struction of  Jerusalem  made  by  Jesus,  in 
Luke  21.  5-36,  he  does  not  say  that  that 
prophecy  was  fulfilled.  He  surely  would 
have  done  so  if  he  had  been  writing  later 
than  A.  D.  70.  He  does  not  do  so  because 
the  destruction  of  the  capital  city  had  not 
yet  taken  place. 

However,  many  other  authorities  think 
that  we  must  decide  upon  a  later  date  for 
the  composition  of  the  third  Gospel.  They 
point  out  the  following  facts:  1.  We  must 
allow  time  for  a  large  number  of  people  to 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  65 

draw  up  narratives  concerning  the  sayings 
and  doings  of  Jesus. 

2.  Twice  in  the  GospeP  Luke  puts  the 
name  of  John  before  that  of  his  brother 
James  in  naming  the  two  together.  Mat- 
thew and  Mark  never  do  that.  They 
always  put  James  first.  This  seems  to  be 
an  indication  that  Luke  wrote  at  a  later 
period  than  the  other  two  synoptists,  and 
at  a  time  when  James  had  died  or  when 
for  some  other  reason  John  was  being 
recognized  as  the  more  prominent  or  in- 
fluential of  the  two. 

3.  The  prophecies  concerning  the  de- 
struction of  Jerusalem  as  recorded  in  Luke 
are  much  more  definite  than  the  parallel 
prophecies  in  Matthew  and  Mark.  Even 
though  Luke  does  not  say  that  these 
prophecies  had  been  fulfilled,  their  greater 
definiteness  bears  witness  to  that  fact. 
After  the  event  the  details  of  the  sayings 
of  Jesus  concerning  it  were  remembered 
more  vividly  and  recorded  more  accurately. 

4.  In  the  midst  of  these  prophecies  in 

»  8.  51  and  9.  28. 


66  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Matthew  and  Mark  the  evangeHsts  have 
inserted  a  note  of  warning  to  their  readers 
— *'Let  him  that  readeth  understand."^ 
Luke  omits  this  clause,  the  time  for  such 
warning  having  gone  by. 

5.  The  designation  of  Jesus  as  "Lord," 
not  found  at  all  in  Mark  and  only  occa- 
sionally in  Matthew,  is  more  frequent  in 
Luke.  This  seems  to  be  a  mark  of  later 
date,  when  this  title  was  becoming  more 
common  among  the  disciples.  Among 
those  who  believe  that  the  Gospel  was 
written  after  the  death  of  Paul  and  after 
the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  and  in  the 
later  old  age  of  Luke,  we  may  mention 
Beyschlag,  Bleek,  Cook,  Credner,  De  Wette, 
Ewald,  Julicher,  Plummer,  Ramsay,  Renan, 
Reuss,  Sanday,  Schenkel,  and  Weiss. 

III.  Place  of  Writing 

Jerome  says  that  Luke  wrote  the  Gospel 
in  Achaia  and  Boeotia.  Godet  selects  the 
city  of  Corinth  as  the  most  likely  place. 
Holtzmann,  Hug,  Keim,  and  Zeller  guess 

>  Matt.  24.  15;  Mark  13.  14. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  67 

that  the  Gospel  was  written  at  Rome, 
Michselis  and  Tholuck  at  Csesarea,  Hilgen- 
feld  in  Asia  Minor,  and  Kostlin  at  Ephesus. 
Plummer  says  there  is  no  evidence  for  or 
against  any  of  these  places.  Weiss  adds 
that  '*all  conjectures  as  to  the  place  of 
composition  are  quite  visionary  and  have 
no  value  whatever."  Under  these  cir- 
cumstances may  we  not  conjecture  that  it 
was  at  Csesarea  in  the  days  of  Paul's  im- 
prisonment that  the  first  considerable  gath- 
ering of  material  for  this  Gospel  narrative 
was  made,  and  that  Luke  continued  his 
work  as  opportunity  offered  during  the 
later  imprisonment  at  Rome,  and  that  in 
the  after  days  in  the  moments  of  leisure 
he  may  have  snatched  from  his  missionary 
labors  he  completed  the  book,  giving  it 
its  final  touches  in  some  village  retreat  in 
Greece,  and  writing  last  of  all  the  preface 
dedicating  it  to  Theophilus  some  time  be- 
tween A.  D.  70  and  80?  This  gradual  gath- 
ering and  shaping  of  the  material  in  hand 
would  leave  room  to  account  for  all  the 
phenomena  involved  in  the  text,  and  the 


68  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

final  finishing  in  the  intervals  of  an  itin- 
erant missionary  village  visitation  in  Greece 
would  meet  the  requirement  of  Jerome's 
suggestion  that  it  was  composed  in  places 
in  both  Achaia  and  Boeotia.  In  various 
humble  village  homes  by  the  light  of  a 
dim-burning  olive-oil  wick  we  see  the  be- 
loved evangelist  completing  the  most  beau- 
tiful book  ever  written. 

IV.  The  Gospel  for  the  Gentiles 

When  we  turn  to  the  study  of  the  book, 
the  first  thing  we  notice  is  that  it  is  written 
from  a  Gentile  point  of  view,  and  that 
makes  it  noteworthy  at  once.  It  is  the 
only  book  in  the  New  Testament  of  which 
that  can  be  said,  except  the  book  of  Acts, 
also  written  by  Luke. 

All  the  other  books  in  our  Bible,  both  in 
the  Old  Testament  and  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, were  written  by  Jews.  Our  Bible  is 
a  Jewish  book  from  beginning  to  end,  as 
far  as  authorship  is  concerned.  Its  writers 
were  Jews  or  Christian  Jews,  but  they 
*'were  all  of  the  Hebrew  race,  and  they  all 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  69 

had  more  or  less  of  the  Hebrew  prejudice 
and  point  of  view.  Jesus  was  a  Jew.  All 
of  the  twelve  apostles  were  Jews.  All  of 
the  first  churches  were  composed  wholly  of 
Jews.  Even  Paul,  the  champion  of  the 
Gentiles,  was  himself  a  Jew,  and  he  never 
wholly  freed  himself  from  the  results  of  his 
rabbinical  training  and  thought.  If  Luke 
had  not  written  these  books,  all  of  Gentile 
Christendom  would  have  been  dependent 
forever  upon  Jewish  sources  for  the  whole 
of  its  record  of  the  revelation  of  God  unto 
men.  But  in  these  two  books  we  see  how 
the  life  of  Jesus  and  the  fortunes  of  the 
early  Christian  Church  appear  from  a 
Gentile  point  of  view.  The  Gospel  accord- 
ing to  Matthew  gives  us  a  Jewish  point  of 
view.  The  Gospel  according  to  Mark 
gives  us  a  Jew's  account,  adapted  to  the 
use  of  Gentiles.  Now  Luke,  a  Gentile, 
will  write  for  Gentiles,  and  our  New  Tes- 
tament will  have  a  Gentile  Gospel,  a  Gospel 
written  for  us  and  by  one  of  ourselves."^ 
How  do  we  know  that  Luke  is  writing 

1  Hayea,  The  Synoptic  Problem,  p.  80. 


70  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

for  us  rather  than  for  the  Jews?  1.  Be- 
cause of  his  explanations  of  things  with 
which  the  Jews  were  perfectly  familiar,  but 
of  which  Gentiles  might  be  supposed  to  be 
ignorant.  He  tells  us  that  Nazareth  was  a 
city  of  Galilee.^  He  gives  us  the  same 
information  concerning  Capernaum.^  He 
says  that  the  feast  of  unleavened  bread 
was  called  the  passover.^  All  Jews  knew 
these  things  without  being  told.  Luke 
wrote  them  down  for  the  benefit  of  those 
who  were  not  acquainted  with  the  geog- 
raphy of  Palestine  or  with  the  feasts  of 
the  Jewish  ritual.  However,  it  is  when  we 
turn  from  such  small  details  to  consider  the 
general  spirit  of  the  book  that  its  Gentile 
point  of  view  becomes  most  apparent. 

2.  Of  the  three  synoptic  Gospels  this  is 
by  far  the  most  catholic  in  its  sympathies 
and  universalistic  in  its  outlook.  (1)  It 
has  a  genealogy  of  Jesus,  even  as  Matthew 
had,  but  the  genealogy  of  Matthew  was  a 
Jewish  genealogy.  It  gave  the  generation 
of  Jesus  Christ,  the  son  of  David,  the  son 

»1.  26.  S4.  31.  3  22.  1. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  71 

of  Abraham.^  Abraham  was  the  father  of 
the  Jews,  and  Matthew  was  content  to 
show  that  Jesus  was  a  descendant  of  Abra- 
ham, a  genuine  Jew  by  race.  Luke  is  not 
content  with  that  genealogy,  and  therefore 
he  writes  another  one,  and  he  carries  the 
line  of  ancestors  back  of  David  and  ^ack  of 
Abraham  and  up  to  Adam,  the  father  of 
the  human  race.  Then  he  says  of  Adam 
that  he  was  the  son  of  God.^  Was  Jesus  a 
Jew  and  a  son  of  Abraham,  and  did  he 
therefore  belong  to  the  Jewish  race?  Yes, 
that  was  all  true,  but  it  was  not  the  whole 
of  the  truth.  Jesus  was  a  Jew,  but  he  was 
more  than  that:  he  was  a  man,  and  he 
belonged  to  all  mankind. 

That  was  the  first  thing  that  this  Gen- 
tile Gospel  would  make  perfectly  clear  to 
the  world.  Our  Lord  is  a  son  of  Adam,  as 
we  are  sons  of  Adam.  He  is  flesh  of  our 
flesh  and  bone  of  our  bone.  He  is  our 
brother-man.  He  is  not  far  from  every  one 
of  us.  Our  God  hath  made  of  one  blood  all 
nations  of  men;  and  if  any  man  will  seek 

>  Matt.  1. 1.  2  3.  38. 


72  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

for  our  Lord,  he  will  find  that  he  is  of  one 
blood  with  himself,  a  son  of  Adam,  a  son 
of  God.  Jesus  is  the  last  Adam.  He  be- 
longs to  humanity.  He  is  the  Kinsman- 
Redeemer  of  the  race.  Matthew  gave  us 
the  Jewish  genealogy.  Luke  makes  it  a 
Gentile  genealogy  by  carrying  it  beyond 
Abraham  the  father  of  the  Jews  to  Adam 
the  father  of  the  race.  Jesus  belongs  to 
the  Jews,  but  he  belongs  to  us  as  well  as 
to  them.  He  is  the  Saviour  of  all  men. 
He  is  the  Head  of  all  humanity. 

(2)  We  look  into  Matthew's  narrative, 
and  we  find  the  story  of  the  wise  men 
coming  from  the  East  with  their  question, 
"Where  is  he  who  is  born  King  of  the 
Jewsf^^  We  turn  to  Luke's  account  of 
the  birth  of  Jesus  and  we  find  no  such 
question,  but  an  angel  makes  announce- 
ment from  the  open  sky,  "I  bring  you  good 
tidings  of  great  joy  which  shall  be  to  all 
the  people."^  The  Jesus  of  whom  Luke 
writes  is  to  be,  not  only  the  King  of  the 
Jews,  but  also  the  Saviour  of  all  men. 

'  Matt.  2.  2.        »  2.  10. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  73 

(3)  Matthew  tells  us  that  Isaiah  spoke  of 
John  the  Baptist  and  called  him 

The  voice  of  one  crying  in  the  wilderness. 
Make  ye  ready  the  way  of  the  Lord, 
Make  his  paths  straight/ 

Luke  tells  us  about  the  ministry  of  John 
the  Baptist,  and  he  quotes  the  prophecy  of 
Isaiah  as  fulfilled  in  him;  but  he  is  not 
willing  to  stop  where  Matthew  did  in  that 
quotation.  He  carries  it  on  until  he  makes 
of  it  a  prophecy  of  comfort  to  the  Gentiles. 
He  says:  "Listen!  These  are  the  words 
with  which  Isaiah  continues  his  prophecy. 

Every  valley  shall  be  filled. 

And  every  mountain  and  hill  shall  be  brought  low; 

And  the  crooked  shall  become  straight. 

And  the  rough  ways  smooth; 

And  all  flesh  shall  see  the  salvation  of  God."^ 

It  surely  was  worth  while  to  add  that 
sentence,  for  it  shows  that  this  Jewish 
prophecy  is  of  interest  to  all  mankind. 
Gentiles  as  well  as  Jews  are  to  see  the 
salvation  of  God. 


1  Matt.  3.  3.         2  Luke  3.  5,  6. 


74  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

(4)  Did  Jesus  confine  practically  the 
whole  of  his  own  ministry  to  the  Jews  ? 
Yes,  but  Luke  is  careful  to  tell  us  what 
no  one  of  the  other  evangelists  had  re- 
corded for  us,  that  in  his  ministry  to  the 
Jews  Jesus  reminded  them  again  and  again 
that  the  providence  of  God  had  been  dis- 
played in  behalf  of  the  Gentiles  as  well  as 
in  behalf  of  themselves.  In  the  beginning 
of  his  ministry,  in  the  synagogue  at  Naza- 
reth, Jesus  said:  "There  were  many  Jewish 
widows  in  the  time  of  Elijah,  but  Elijah 
passed  them  all  by  and  his  miraculous  help 
was  given  to  a  heathen  widow  in  Sidon. 
And  there  were  many  Jewish  lepers  in  the 
time  of  Elisha,  but  the  prophet  did  not 
heal  any  of  them.  He  healed  the  Syrian 
heathen  Naaman  instead."^  The  Jews 
were  filled  with  wrath  at  these  sayings  and 
cast  Jesus  out  of  their  city.  That  was 
just  the  difference  between  Jesus  and  his 
fellow  countrymen,  Luke  seems  to  say. 
They  were  exclusive  and  intolerant;  he 
was  sympathetic  with  all.     They  wanted 

» Luke  4.  25-30. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  75 

all  good  things  for  themselves;  he  shared 
all  his  good  things  with  all  who  asked  for 
them  and  all  who  needed  them,  Samaritans 
or  Galileans,  Gentiles  or  Jews. 

(5)  Possibly  the  most  characteristic  para- 
bles of  the  gospel  which  Jesus  preached  are 
to  be  found  in  the  fifteenth  chapter  of  the 
Gospel  according  to  Luke.  Those  three 
parables,  the  lost  sheep,  the  lost  coin,  and 
the  lost  son,  sum  up  all  the  good  news  of 
certain  salvation  to  sinful  men,  and  two  of 
them,  the  lost  coin  and  the  lost  son,  are  re- 
corded only  by  Luke.  The  three  parables 
surely  would  rank  among  the  most  precious 
of  all  the  sayings  of  Jesus.  They  teach  the 
Father's  uncalculating  and  unceasing  sacri- 
fice and  search  until  the  last  lost  sheep  is 
found.  They  teach  the  Father's  loving  il- 
lumination and  diligent  labor  until  the  last 
coin  with  his  image  and  superscription 
upon  it  has  been  restored.  They  teach  the 
Father's  warm  welcome  for  every  prodigal 
who  turns  his  face  toward  home.  His 
grace  is  free  to  all,  and  it  never  fails.  We 
could  spare  any  other  parable  better  than 


76  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

the  parable  of  the  prodigal  son.  We  owe 
its  preservation  to  the  Gentile  Luke. 

(6)  We  are  not  surprised  to  find  that  the 
words,  "grace,"  "Saviour,"  "salvation," 
and  "evangelize"  are  found  in  this  Gospel 
more  often  than  in  any  other.  Luke  him- 
self was  an  evangelist.  He  tells  us  that 
the  angels  are  evangelists,^  and  John  the 
Baptist  was  an  evangelist,^  and  Jesus  was 
an  evangelist,^  and  the  twelve  apostles 
were  evangehsts.^  Ten  times  in  this  book 
that  verb,  "to  evangehze,"  occurs.  The 
whole  of  the  Gospel  has  to  do  with  good 
news  for  all. 

"In  that  first  sermon  in  the  synagogue  at 
Nazareth  Jesus  read  for  his  text  from  the 
prophet  Isaiah: 

The  Spirit  of  the  Lord  is  upon  me, 

Because  he  anointed  me  to  preach  good  tidings  to 

the  poor: 
He  hath  sent  me  to  proclaim  release  to  the  cap- 
tives, 
And  recovering  of  sight  to  the  blind, 
To  set  at  liberty  them  that  are  bruised, 
To  proclaim  the  acceptable  year  of  the  Lord. 

»  1.  19  and  2.  10.     23.  18.      «4.  18,  43;  7.  22;  8.  1;  16.  16;  20.  1.      «9.  6. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  77 

There  Jesus  closed  the  book  and  gave  it 
back  to  the  attendant.  It  was  a  strange 
place  to  quit  in  his  reading.  It  was  right 
in  the  middle  of  a  sentence.  Jesus  did  not 
read  the  whole  of  the  prophecy.  He  did 
not  even  finish  the  paragraph.  He  did  not 
even  read  to  a  period.  There  was  much 
of  comfort  and  of  good  news  in  the  re- 
mainder of  the  sentence  and  of  the  para- 
graph and  of  the  prophecy.  Jesus  stops 
short  at  this  point.  Surely,  it  must  have 
been  with  conscious  intention.  Surely,  it 
must  have  been  with  some  good  reason. 
We  look  for  that  reason  and  we  find  that 
the  next  following  words  were,  'And  to 
proclaim  the  day  of  vengeance  of  our 
God.*  When  the  eyes  of  Jesus  fell  upon 
those  words  he  closed  the  book.  He  would 
not  read  them.  His  message  was  a  message 
of  grace  and  not  a  proclamation  of  ven- 
geance. He  would  rather  leave  the  sen- 
tence unfinished  than  to  leave  any  doubt 
in  any  mind  as  to  that  fact.  He  went  on 
to  preach  his  good  tidings,  and  we  read 
that  all  bare  him  witness,  and  wondered  at 


78  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUI. 

the  words  of  grace  which  proceeded  out  of 
his  mouth. ^ 

"Luke  does  not  wonder.  He  seems  to 
think  that  only  words  of  grace  would  be 
natural  to  Jesus.  He  pictures  the  Master 
as  the  gracious  Redeemer,  gracious  both  in 
matter  of  speech  and  in  manner  of  life. 
Over  against  the  ungraciousness  of  Simon 
the  Pharisee  Luke  sets  in  contrast  the 
graciousness  of  Jesus  to  the  woman  who 
was  a  sinner.  He  was  a  perfect  gentleman 
even  to  her.  She  had  heard  him  talk  of 
the  grace  of  God.  She  was  willing  to  put  it 
to  the  test  for  herself.  Jesus  did  not  fail 
her  in  the  moment  of  trial.  His  gracious- 
ness included  all.  It  recognized  no  barrier 
of  social  distinctions.  The  courtesy  which 
Simon  had  failed  to  show  to  his  guest  she 
more  than  made  up  with  her  love.  Jesus 
could  not  be  outdone  in  courtesy  by  any- 
one. He  was  even  more  gracious  to  her 
than  she  was  grateful  to  him.^ 

"Was  the  grace  of  God  ever  set  forth  with 
such    pathetic    impressiveness    as    in    that 

>  4.  22.        2  7.  48. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  79 

pearl  of  all  the  parables,  where  we  read 
that  while  the  returning  prodigal  was  yet 
a  long  way  off  his  father  saw  him  and  ran 
to  meet  him,  and  then  celebrated  his  re- 
turn with  the  best  robe  and  a  fitting  feast 
and  music  and  dancing  ?  The  grace  of  the 
dancers  was  only  the  faintest  symbol  of  the 
grace  in  that  father's  heart.  No  gracious 
act  of  earth  can  do  more  than  typify  the 
heavenly  Father's  exhaustless  grace.  Can 
we  imagine  the  grace  in  the  manner  of  Jesus 
and  in  his  tone  as  he  spoke  that  parable? 

"How  gracious  he  was  to  the  ten  lepers, 
although  one  of  them  was  an  alien  Samari- 
tan! How  gracious  he  was  to  Zacchaeus, 
promising  salvation  to  his  house,  although 
he  had  been  a  defrauding  and  despicable 
publican,  as  little  and  mean  in  his  spirit 
as  he  was  little  and  mean  in  his  stature. 
How  gracious  he  was  to  Mary  when 
Martha's  short  temper  had  snapped  and 
she  was  ready  to  ask  the  Master  to  join 
her  in  scolding  the  remissness  of  the 
younger  girl!  Jesus  was  as  gracious  to  her 
as  her  sister  was  indignant  with  her. 


80  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

"How  gracious  he  was  to  that  dying 
thief!  The  malefactor  was  suffering  his 
just  deserts.  He  had  been  a  robber,  and 
in  all  probability  a  murderer,  and  he  was 
receiving  the  penalty  due  for  his  crimes. 
His  fellow  malefactor  prayed  to  Jesus  for 
salvation,  *Save  thyself  and  us,'  but  it  was 
in  words  of  mockery  and  not  of  devotion; 
and  Jesus  paid  no  heed  to  him.  Possibly 
he  was  the  only  one  who  ever  asked  Jesus 
for  salvation  and  found  his  cry  for  help 
unheeded.  The  other  dying  thief  recog- 
nized the  innocence  of  Jesus  and  rebuked 
his  fellow  sufferer  for  his  failure  in  courtesy 
to  such  a  character.  He  did  not  ask  for 
salvation  from  the  cross  or  from  death. 
He  asked  Jesus  only  to  remember  him  when 
the  kingdom  preached  had  come.  It  was 
the  most  sublime  faith  chronicled  in  our 
New  Testament.  He  believed  in  the  char- 
acter of  Jesus  and  in  the  coming  of  his 
kingdom,  despite  all  contrary  evidence. 
All  of  the  disciples  of  Jesus  had  forsaken 
him  and  fled  away.  They  had  seen  Jesus 
raise    the    dead    and    yet    their   faith    had 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  81 

failed  them  in  that  hour.  The  thief  upon 
the  cross  sees  Jesus  dying  upon  the  cross 
at  his  side,  and  yet  has  faith  in  him! 

"Now  see  with  what  graciousness  Jesus 
makes  response  to  such  faith.  'Verily — 
there  is  no  doubt  about  it.  I  am  not 
stating  to  you  a  mere  possibility,  but  a 
most  certain  truth;  for  where  I  am  there 
shall  also  my  servants  be  with  me;  there- 
fore,— I  say  unto  thee.  To-day  shalt  thou 
be  with  me  in  Paradise.'^  Bossuet  com- 
ments upon  this  promise  as  follows: 
"To-day — what  speed ! — with  me — what 
companionship! — in  Paradise — what  rest!' 
Jesus  had  consorted  with  all  classes  of 
people  here  upon  the  earth.  He  had  been 
no  respecter  of  persons  during  his  ministry. 
He  went  into  paradise  hand  in  hand  with 
a  crucified  thief.  His  graciousness  will  be 
his  characteristic  through  all  eternity  to 
come.  As  it  was  manifest  to  all  alike  in 
the  days  of  his  ministry  it  will  be  manifest 
to  all  alike  for  evermore."^ 

(7)  At  three  crisis  points  in  his  narrative 

1  23.  43.  2  Compare  Hayea,  The  Synoptic  Problem,  pp.  80-84. 


82  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Luke  shows  us  how  Jesus  was  rejected  by 
the  Galilseans,^  and  by  the  Samaritans,^ 
and  by  the  Judaeans  and  the  assembled 
nation  of  the  Jews  at  the  passover  feast.' 
The  significant  inference  is  that  the  gos- 
pel must  look  beyond  all  of  these  for  its 
greatest  future  growth,  and  in  the  book 
of  Acts  Luke  shows  how  that  actually 
came  to  pass. 

(8)  We  note  that  in  the  beginning  of  the 
Gospel  Luke  is  the  only  one  of  the  evan- 
gelists who  tells  us  the  story  of  Simeon, 
and  the  only  one  to  record  the  song  of  that 
aged  saint: 

Now  lettest  thou  thy  servant  depart,  Lord, 

According  to  thy  word,  in  peace; 

For  mine  eyes  have  seen  thy  salvation. 

Which  thou  hast  prepared  before  the  face  of  all 

peoples; 
A  light  for  revelation  to  the  Gentiles, 
And  the  glory  of  thy  people  Israel.* 

Luke  sets  that  phrase,  "a  revelation  to  the 
Gentiles,"  in  the  very  forefront  of  his 
Gospel. 

J  4.  29.        2  9.  53.        «  23.  23.  <  2.  29-32. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  83 

Then  we  turn  to  the  middle  of  the  Gospel 
and  in  the  tenth  chapter  we  find  a  fuller 
account  of  the  sending  out  of  the  seventy 
than  any  other  evangelist  has  given  us; 
and  the  commentators  tell  us  that  the 
Jews  reckoned  the  Gentile  nations  to  be 
seventy  in  number,  and  as  the  twelve 
apostles  represented  the  twelve  tribes  of 
Israel  the  seventy  evangelists  by  their 
very  number  represented  the  world-wide 
destination  of  the  gospel. 

In  the  tenth  chapter  of  the  book  of 
Genesis  there  is  an  enumeration  of  seventy 
nations,  and  the  Jews  believed  that  these 
nations  represented  the  whole  human  race. 
Therefore,  in  the  Talmud  we  find  it  re- 
corded that  at  the  feast  of  tabernacles  the 
Jews  offered  seventy  bullocks  for  the 
seventy  nations,  that  the  rain  may  fall 
on  the  fields  of  all  the  world. ^ 

Then  we  turn  to  the  end  of  the  Gospel, 
and  in  its  closing  words  we  hear  the  resur- 
rected Lord  commissioning  his  church  to 
preach    repentance   and   remission   of   sins 


1  Lightfoot'a  Hor.  Talm.,  John  7.  2. 


84  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

unto  all  the  nations,  beginning  from  Jeru- 
salem.^ In  the  beginning  and  the  middle 
and  the  end  of  his  Gospel  Luke  makes  it 
clear  that  this  revelation  of  good  news  is 
for  all  the  nations  of  men. 

(9)  When  Matthew  records  the  choice  of 
the  twelve  apostles,  and  lists  their  names, 
he  proceeds  at  once  to  give  the  charge 
which  Jesus  laid  upon  them  before  he  sent 
them  forth,  and  the  very  first  command- 
ment laid  upon  them  was  this:  "Go  not 
into  any  way  of  the  Gentiles,  and  enter 
not  into  any  city  of  the  Samaritans:  but 
go  rather  to  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of 
Israel.^  Luke  tells  us  of  the  sending  out 
of  the  twelve  and  of  the  charge  given  them 
by  the  Master,  but  he  omits  any  refusal  of 
the  gospel  to  the  Gentiles  or  any  limitation 
of  their  ministry  to  the  Jews.^  In  the  next 
chapter  he  gives  a  much  longer  and  fuller 
account  of  the  sending  out  of  the  seventy, 
and  no  limitations  are  suggested  for  their 
evangelism,  while  their  number  suggested 
that  they  might  go  into  all  the  world. 

I  24.  47.        2  Matt.  10.  5,  6.        3  9.  i_6. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  85 

(10)  Luke  was  the  first  church  historian. 
Mark  and  Matthew  wrote  memoirs.    John 
wrote  a  philosophy  of  reUgion.     No  other 
writers    in    the    New    Testament    devoted 
themselves  to  narration.    Luke  the  Gentile 
set    himself    to    write    a   historical    gospel, 
following  Gentile  models  at  certain  points 
and   connecting   his   account  w^ith   Gentile 
history   throughout.      He    seems    to   have 
seen  clearly  from  the  very  first  that  the 
interests    of    Christianity    were    bound    up 
with   the   interests    of    world   history    and 
that  the  birth  of  Jesus  was  an  event  of 
importance   to   the  whole  Roman  empire. 
He  is  the  only  writer  in  the  New  Testament 
who  mentions  a  Roman  emperor  by  name. 
He  joins  the  name  of  Jesus  with  that  of 
the  governor  Quirinius  and  Csesar  Augus- 
tus.^    He  unites  the  baptism  of  John  and 
the  beginning  ministry  of  Jesus  with  the 
reign   of   Caesar  Tiberius   and   the   rule   of 
Pilate  and  Herod  and  Philip  and  Lysanias, 
as  well  as  the  high-priesthood  of  Annas  and 
Caiaphas.^ 

1 2.  1,  2.         '  3.  1,  2. 


86  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Almost  all  the  connecting  links  between 
the  gospel  history  and  contemporary  Gen- 
tile history  are  furnished  us  by  Luke,  He 
begins  at  Bethlehem,  but  he  ends  at  Rome. 
He  opens  his  narrative  with  the  vision  of 
Zacharias  in  the  seclusion  of  the  temple 
at  Jerusalem,  but  he  closes  it  with  the 
preaching  of  the  apostle  Paul  in  the  world 
capital.  From  beginning  to  end  he  is  bent 
on  showing  that  the  gospel  is  a  gospel  for  a 
world  empire,  for  all  nations  of  men,  and  for 
all  the  future  ages  of  time.  Van  Oosterzee 
was  right  when  he  said,  "As  Paul  led  the 
people  of  the  Lord  out  of  the  bondage  to 
the  law  into  the  enjoyment  of  gospel 
liberty,  so  did  Luke  raise  sacred  history 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  Israelitish 
nationality  to  the  higher  and  holier  ground 
of  universal  humanity.'"^  We  owe  that  to 
this  Gentile  writer.  His  explanations  for 
Gentile  readers,  his  allusions  to  Gentile 
rulers  and  contemporary  Gentile  history, 
his  characteristic  additions  of  Gentile 
prophecies  and  promises  and  parables  com- 

>  Quoted  by  SchafiF,  op.  cU.,  p.  659. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  87 

bine  to  make  this  the  Gentile  Gospel;  and, 
surely,  we  Gentiles  can  never  be  grateful 
enough  that  so  much  of  our  New  Testa- 
ment was  written  from  a  Gentile  point  of 
view.  As  Paul  is  the  apostle  to  the  Gen- 
tiles, Luke  is  the  evangelist  for  the  Gen- 
tiles. The  Gospel  according  to  Luke  and 
the  book  of  Acts  are  written  by  a  Gentile 
for  the  Gentile  world. 

V.  The  Gospel  of  an  Educated  Man 

Luke  is  the  only  one  of  the  four  evan- 
gelists who  had  a  scientific  training.  We 
would  expect  to  see  the  results  of  that 
training  in  his  writings.  We  think  that  it 
is  apparent  in  his  Gospel  in  at  least  four 
particulars:  1.  In  his  accuracy.  He  tells 
Theophilus  that  he  has  traced  the  course 
of  events  accurately  from  the  first,  and 
that  therefore  Theophilus  may  rest  assured 
of  the  certainty  of  these  things  which  he 
finds  here  recorded.^  Something  of  the 
scholar's  exactness  is  included  in  the 
ideal   of    Luke,  and    he    seems    to    have 

»  1.  3,  4. 


88  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

attained  his  ideal  in  a  rather  remarkable 
degree. 

Modern  criticism  again  and  again  has 
attacked  the  correctness  of  his  statements, 
but  it  never  has  been  successful  in  proving 
any  serious  mistake.  Luke  said,  in  Acts 
17.  6,  that  the  magistrates  in  Thessalonica 
were  called  politarchs,  or  rulers  of  the  city. 
It  was  pointed  out  for  many  years  that 
this  title  is  not  to  be  found  anywhere  in 
Greek  literature,  and  therefore  it  was  con- 
fidently claimed  that  Luke  had  made  a 
mistake  in  using  it.  Yet  all  the  while  an 
arch  was  spanning  the  main  street  of  the 
city  with  an  inscription  upon  it  containing 
the  names  of  the  seven  politarchs  who  had 
erected  it.  When  the  arch  was  destroyed 
during  a  riot  there  in  the  last  century  the 
British  consul  obtained  possession  of  its 
broken  fragments  and  they  are  in  the 
British  Museum  to-day. 

Luke  calls  the  governor  of  Malta  the 
Primus,  or  chief  man.^  The  scholars  could 
not  find  this  name  anywhere,  and  so  they 

•  Acts  28.  7. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  89 

were  sure  that  Luke  had  made  another 
mistake.  However,  an  ancient  inscription 
has  been  dug  up  in  Malta  with  this  title 
upon  it;  and  Luke's  accuracy  has  been 
vindicated  at  this  point.  Luke  describes 
Philippi  as  a  chief  city  of  the  meris  of 
Macedonia.*  Here  was  a  new  name  for  a 
district  or  province,  and  even  Westcott 
and  Hort  concluded  that  Luke  was  in 
error  in  using  it,  and  they  have  marked  it 
as  a  doubtful  reading  in  their  text.  How- 
ever, since  their  death  some  ancient  Mace- 
donian coins  have  been  discovered  with 
this  word  upon  them. 

It  is  dangerous  to  accuse  Luke  of  inac- 
curacy in  anything.  Time  and  new 
discoveries  have  proven  him  right  and  his 
critics  wrong  again  and  again.  Illustrations 
could  be  multiplied.  Such  eminent  modern 
authorities  as  Harnack  and  Ramsay  rank 
Luke  "in  the  first  class  of  historians,  both 
for  trustworthiness  in  his  details,  and  in 
his  judgment  for  selecting  the  subjects 
which  are  of  the  first  importance  and  must 

» Acta  16.  12. 


90  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

be  treated  fully.  .  .  .  We  may  feel  confident 
that  he  showed  at  least  the  same  scrupu- 
lous accuracy  in  reporting  Christ's  teach- 
ings as  he  did  in  speaking  of  slight  secular 
details."^ 

Luke  has  tolerated  no  carelessness  in  re- 
search or  in  composition.  He  seems  to  be 
dissatisfied  with  the  unchronological  ar- 
rangement of  material  in  the  previous 
gospel  narratives,  for  he  assures  Theophilus 
that  he  will  write  events  in  order.^  It  is 
probably  with  this  intent  that  he  concludes 
the  account  of  the  ministry  of  John  the 
Baptist  before  he  begins  the  account  of  the 
ministry  of  Jesus.^  We  find  a  chronologi- 
cal arrangement  throughout.  First,  we 
have  preliminary  and  introductory  ma- 
terial (1-  1  to  4.  13).  Then  follows  the 
ministry  of  Jesus  in  Galilee  (4.  14  to  9.  50). 
Then  we  read  of  the  wider  ministry  outside 
of  Galilee  (9.  51  to  19.  28).  Then  come  the 
closing  scenes  in  Jerusalem  (19. 29  to  24.  53). 
This  division  is  altogether  according  to  time. 


1  Wilson,  Origins  and  Aims  of  the  Four  Gospels,  pp.  62-3. 

2  1.  3.  3  3.  18-20. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  91 

Luke  is  careful  to  insert  the  proper  dates 
upon  occasion.^  The  Greek  word  for 
"year,"  erog,  is  found  in  the  writings 
of  Luke  twenty-six  times  and  in  all  the 
other  books  of  the  New  Testament  only 
twenty-three  times.  The  Greek  word  for 
''month,"  nrjv,  is  found  in  Luke's  writ- 
ings ten  times  and  in  all  the  rest  of  the 
New  Testament  only  eight  times.  The 
more  frequent  occurrence  of  these  words  in 
his  writings  is  an  indication  of  Luke's  de- 
sire to  be  more  accurate  in  his  designations 
of  time. 

2.  Another  result  of  Luke's  university 
training  is  evident  in  his  versatility.  Plum- 
mer  says:  "The  author  of  the  third  Gospel 
and  of  the  Acts  is  the  most  versatile  of  all 
the  New  Testament  writers.  He  can  be  as 
Hebraistic  as  the  seventy,  and  as  free  from 
Hebraisms  as  Plutarch.  And,  in  the  main, 
whether  intentionally  or  not,  he  is  Hebraistic 
in  describing  Hebrew  society,  and  Greek  in 
describing   Greek   society."^     It   demands 


1  1.  5;  2.  1,  2;  2.  21,  22;  2.  42;  3.  1,  2;  3.  23. 

2  Plummer,  op.  cit.,  p.  xlix. 


92  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

something  of  both  talent  and  training  to 
make  such  transitions  of  style  possible. 

3.  To  accuracy  and  versatility  we  may 
add  fluency  as  another  evidence  of  higher 
education  and  broader  culture.  An  un- 
trained man  may  be  very  prolix  in  verbal 
statement  of  facts,  but  if  he  is  set  to  write 
them  down  he  is  apt  to  make  very  short 
work  of  it.  He  is  unaccustomed  to  the 
task  of  composition,  and  he  finds  it  very 
difficult  for  him,  and  he  confines  himself  to 
the  recording  of  the  barest  outline  or  the 
main  essentials.  Other  things  being  equal, 
facility  of  expression  comes  with  practice, 
and  an  educated  man  will  have  had  that 
practice  and  therefore  will  take  more 
pleasure  in  literary  composition.  He  will 
be  ready  to  fill  out  the  more  meager  out- 
line and  to  add  interesting  details  to  the 
essential  features  of  the  narrative.  He 
will  give  us  a  fuller  and  more  symmetrical 
account.  When  we  compare  the  Gospel 
according  to  Luke  with  the  other  synop- 
tics we  find  these  things  to  be  true  of  it. 

(1)  It  is  a  more  comprehensive  account. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  93 

It  begins  with  the  birth  of  the  Forerunner 
and  all  the  interesting  events  connected 
therewith.  The  contents  of  the  first  two 
chapters  are  peculiar  to  Luke.  Mark 
began  with  the  active  ministry  of  John 
the  Baptist.  Matthew  told  us  about  the 
birth  of  Jesus.  Luke  goes  back  of  these 
events  to  find  the  beginning  of  the  new 
dispensation  in  the  prophecy  of  the  birth 
of  John.  Then  Luke  carries  his  narrative 
beyond  that  of  any  of  the  other  Gospels. 
He  is  the  only  one  who  gives  us  any  ac- 
count of  the  ascension  of  Jesus,  which 
would  surely  seem  to  be  the  only  fitting 
end  for  such  a  career  as  that  of  the  In- 
carnate One.  In  the  middle  of  his  Gospel 
Luke  has  given  us  a  large  section — 9.  45 
to  18.  30 — the  most  of  the  material  in 
which  is  peculiar  to  him.  The  other 
Gospels  pass  these  events  over  in  silence, 
and  yet  some  of  them  are  among  the  most 
remarkable  in  our  Lord's  ministry.  This 
section  is  usually  called  "the  greater  in- 
sertion" in  the  gospel  narrative.  Schleier- 
macher  called   it   "the  journey   account.'* 


94  THE  IMOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Others  have  named  it  the  "Gnomology." 
Altogether,  about  one  third  of  the  con- 
tents of  Luke  is  not  to  be  found  in  the 
other  Gospels. 

(2)  As  the  most  comprehensive  account, 
the  Gospel  according  to  Luke  is  the  longest 
of  the  four  Gospels.  It  has  been  calculated 
that  when  the  contents  of  the  synoptic 
Gospels  have  been  divided  into  one  hun- 
dred and  seventy-two  sections  Luke  has 
one  hundred  and  twenty-seven,  or  about 
three  fourths  of  these;  Matthew  has  one 
hundred  and  fourteen,  or  about  two  thirds; 
and  Mark  has  eighty-four,  or  about  one 
half;  and  of  these  one  hundred  and  seventy- 
two  sections  Luke  has  forty-eight,  or  about 
two  sevenths  peculiar  to  himself;  Matthew 
has  twenty -two,  or  about  one  eighth;  and 
Mark  has  five,  or  about  one  thirty-seventh. 

(3)  There  are  twenty  miracles  recorded  in 
this  Gospel,  and  six  of  these  are  peculiar  to 
Luke.  These  are:  The  miraculous  draught 
of  fishes,^  the  raising  of  the  widow's  son  at 
Nain,^   the  healing  of  the  woman  bowed 

»5.  4-11.  2  7.  11-17. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  95 

together,^  the  cure  of  the  dropsical  man,^ 
the  cleansing  of  the  ten  lepers^,  the  re- 
storation of  Malchus's  ear.^  Over  against 
these  six  miracles  peculiar  to  Luke,  Mat- 
thew has  only  three  peculiar  to  himself, 
and  Mark  has  only  two.  Luke,  therefore, 
has  more  than  Matthew  and  Mark 
combined. 

(4)  There  are  twenty-three  parables  re- 
corded in  this  Gospel,  and  of  these  eighteen 
are  peculiar  to  Luke.  These  are:  The  two 
debtors,^  the  good  Samaritan,'^  the  im- 
portunate friend,^  the  rich  fool,^  the  watch- 
ful servants,^  the  barren  fig  tree,^°  the 
chief  seats,^-  the  great  supper, ^^  the  rash 
builder,^^  the  rash  king,^^  the  lost  coin,^^ 
the  lost  son,^"  the  unrighteous  steward,^'' 
the  rich  man  and  Lazarus,^^  the  unprofita- 
ble servants, ^^  the  unjust  judge,-"  the 
Pharisee  and  publican,-^  the  pounds.^^  Over 
against  these  eighteen  parables  peculiar  to 


1  13.  10-17. 

s  14.  1-7. 

M7. 

11-19. 

4  22. 

50.  51. 

6  7.  41-43. 

» 10.  25-37. 

7  11. 

5-8. 

8  12. 

16-21. 

0  12.  35-48. 

10  13.  6-9. 

"14. 

7-11. 

12  14. 

16-24. 

"  14.  28-30. 

IM4.  31,32. 

16  15. 

3-10. 

i"15. 

11-32. 

1M6.  1-13. 

18  16.  19-31. 

19  17. 

7-10. 

20  18. 

1-8. 

21  18.  10-14. 

22  19.  11-27. 

96  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Luke,  Matthew  has  only  ten  and  Mark 
has  only  one.  Therefore  Luke  has  over  a 
third  more  than  Matthew  and  Mark 
combined. 

These  parables  seem  to  be  of  quite  a 
different  character  from  those  in  the  other 
synoptics.  The  parables  in  the  first  Gospel 
had  to  do  chiefly  with  the  kingdom  and  its 
laws.  The  parables  in  the  Gospel  accord- 
ing to  Luke  have  an  individual  and  purely 
human  interest.  They  are  more  personal 
and  more  concrete.  They  do  not  seem  so 
much  like  types  of  spiritual  phenomena  as 
they  do  like  transcripts  from  actual  life. 
They  are  not  so  much  concerned  with 
analogies  from  nature  as  they  are  with  ac- 
curate accounts  of  human  nature.  They  do 
not  idealize  human  nature.  They  represent 
it  as  it  actually  is.  They  are  more  like 
snapshots  at  contemporary  occurrences. 
They  are  stories  based  on  fact.  They 
have  to  do  with  real  men  and  women  and 
the  common  things  of  daily  life. 

What  testimony  they  bear  to  the  fresh- 
ness and  originality  of  the  conversation  of 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  97 

Jesus!  Some  of  these  parables  are  spoken 
spontaneously  in  answer  to  some  question 
put  at  him  unexpectedly.  He  must  have 
had  a  very  ready  wit  and  very  unusual 
powers  of  observation  to  produce  such  apt 
illustrations  of  his  truth  at  a  moment's 
notice.  No  wonder  the  common  people 
heard  him  gladly.  He  talked  about 
things  that  they  knew,  and  showed  them 
hidden  depths  of  wisdom  where  they  had 
seen  only  the  utterly  commonplace.  These 
parables  would  go  home  to  the  hearts  of 
all.  They  showed  the  way  of  salvation 
from  the  materials  close  at  hand.  The 
truth  embodied  in  these  tales  could  be 
appreciated  by  anyone.  Their  simplicity 
was  their  chief  charm.  Their  homeliness 
was  one  element  of  their  power. 

(5)  Of  the  interesting  narratives  peculiar 
to  Luke  we  may  mention  as  examples  the 
events  connected  with  the  birth  of  John 
the  Baptist  and  of  Jesus,  including  the 
annunciation,  the  story  of  the  shepherds, 
the  meeting   with  Simeon  and  with  Anna,^ 

11.  5  to  2.  40. 


98  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

the  temple  visit  at  the  age  of  twelve/  the 
scene  in  the  synagogue  at  Nazareth,^  the 
feast  in  the  home  of  Simon  the  Pharisee,^ 
the  intolerance  of  James  and  John,^  the 
story  of  Martha  and  Mary,^  the  story  of 
Zacchseus,^  the  story  of  the  penitent  thief/ 
and  the  story  of  the  walk  to  Emmaus.^ 
The  mere  mention  of  these  narratives  and 
miracles  and  parables  makes  it  evident  at 
once  that  the  greater  length  of  the  third 
Gospel  is  not  due  to  any  mere  padding  or 
prolixity;  for  these  things  belong  to  the 
most  precious  portions  of  the  record  of 
the  life  and  teaching  of  our  Lord.  Yet  the 
longest  Gospel  might  have  been  due  to  a 
greater  abundance  of  material  on  hand  or 
to  a  greater  abundance  of  leisure  for  writ- 
ing. The  final  and  crowning  test  of  an  edu- 
cated man's  composition  will  be  found  in 
his  literary  style.  To  accuracy,  versatility, 
fluency  does  Luke  add  beauty  of  literary 
style  ? 

4.   Renan   says  that  this  is   "the  most 


>  2.  41-52.  2  4.  16-30.  =  7.  36-50.  *  9.  49-54. 

*  10.  38-42.  »  19.^1-10.  7  23.  40-43.  «  24.  13-35. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  99 

literary  of  the  Gospels,"  and  he  adds  that 
it  is  "a  beautiful  narrative,  well  contrived, 
at  once  Hebraic  and  Hellenic,  uniting  the 
emotion  of  the  drama  with  the  serenity  of 
the  idyl."^ 

Notice  (1)  the  language  Luke  employs. 
It  is  the  most  beautiful  Greek  in  the  New 
Testament,  with  the  possible  exception  of 
that  found  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews. 
Luke  is  less  Hebraic  than  the  other  evan- 
gelists. His  first  two  chapters  have  a 
stronger  Hebraic  coloring  than  any  other 
portion  of  the  New  Testament,  and  this 
is  a  proof  either  of  Luke's  personal  versa- 
tility or  of  his  faithful  reproduction  of 
some  Hebraic  original  of  this  part  of  his 
narrative.  When  he  is  Hebraic  he  is 
thoroughly  so;  but  when  he  writes  Greek 
it  is  better  Greek  than  the  other  evan- 
gelists could  command;  and  where  he  is 
most  independent  of  all  previous  effort,  as 
in  the  preface  to  his  own  narrative,  his 
Greek  is  of  the  finest  quality  and  merits 
comparison  with  the  best  of  the  classical 

^  Renan,  op.  cit,  p.  282. 


100  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

models.  Taking  the  Gospel  as  a  whole, 
its  Greek  will  be  found  to  stand  about 
midway  between  the  classical  perfection  of 
the  ancients  and  the  common,  or  Hel- 
lenistic, Greek  of  Luke's  day.  It  is  the 
Greek  of  an  educated  man  as  distinguished 
from  the  current  Greek  of  ordinary  use. 

Notice  (2)  that  Luke  has  the  richest  vo- 
cabulary of  any  of  the  gospel  writers.  The 
words  peculiar  to  Luke  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment are  variously  estimated,  according  to 
various  readings  of  the  text,  from  seven 
hundred  and  fifty  to  eight  hundred  and 
fifty-one;  and  in  the  Gospel  from  two 
hundred  and  sixty-one  to  three  hundred 
and  twelve  of  these  occur.  The  richness  of 
a  man's  vocabulary  is  usually  a  very  fair 
measure  of  the  degree  of  his  culture.  The 
uneducated  man  has  a  very  limited  fund 
of  words  at  his  command.  The  well-read 
and  well-trained  man  is  continually  adding 
to  his  supply. 

Notice  (3)  the  very  effective  contrasts 
which  are  characteristic  of  Luke's  grouping 
of  his  material.     All  through  the  Gospel 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  101 

we  find  two  opposing  characters  set  side  by 
side,  that  we  may  see  them  together  and 
mark  the  difference  between  them.  There 
are  the  two  annunciations  in  the  beginning, 
to  Zacharias  slow  to  beheve  and  to  Mary 
the  instantly  obedient.  Then  follow  such 
contrasts  as  those  offered  by  Simon  and 
the  sinful  woman,  Martha  and  Mary,  the 
ungrateful  Jewish  lepers  and  the  grateful 
Samaritan,  the  unneighborly  Levite  and 
priest  and  the  neighborly  Samaritan,  the 
Pharisee  and  the  publican,  the  rich  man 
and  Lazarus,  the  prodigal  and  his  elder 
brother,  the  sleepy  and  surly  friend  and 
the  sleepless  and  gracious  God,  the  unjust 
judge  and  the  loving  Father  of  all,  the 
hostile  priesthood  and  the  hearkening  peo- 
ple, the  work  of  Jesus  and  the  work  of  the 
devil,  and  the  blessings  and  the  woes  of 
the  Sermon  on  the  Plain. 

Sanday  says  that  Luke  has  more  literary 
ambition  than  his  fellows.^  Ramsay  de- 
clares that  he  "brings  to  the  treatment  of 
his  subjects  genius,  literary  skill,  and  sym- 

» Book  by  Book,  p.  401. 


102  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

pathetic  historical  insight."  Plummer  says: 
"He  possesses  the  art  of  composition.  He 
knows  not  only  how  to  tell  a  tale  truth- 
fully, but  how  to  tell  it  with  effect.  .  .  . 
As  the  fine  literary  taste  of  Renan  affirms, 
it  is  the  most  beautiful  book  in  the  world. "^ 

VI.  The  Gospel  of  the  Physician 

If  Paul  had  not  told  us  that  Luke  was  a 
physician  we  could  have  been  assured  of  it 
from  the  internal  evidence  afforded  in  his 
writing.  1.  This  is  apparent  in  his  fre- 
quent references  to  the  healing  work  of 
Jesus.^ 

2.  liuke  is  the  only  one  of  the  evangelists 
to  record  the  surgical  miracle  of  the  heal- 
ing of  Malchus's  ear.^ 

3.  Of  the  six  miracles  recorded  by  Luke 
alone,  five  are  miracles  of  healing,  if  we 
include  among  them  the  raising  of  the 
widow's  son  at  Nain.^  The  four  others 
are,  the  healing  of  the  woman  who  had 
a   spirit   of   infirmity   for   eighteen   years,^ 


» Plummer,  op.  cit.,  xlvi.        24.  18;  9.  1;  9.  2;  9.  6;  10.  9. 
»  22.  51.  *  7.  11-17.  »  13.  10-17. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  103 

and  of  the  man  aflBicted  with  the  dropsy/ 
the  cleansing  of  the  ten  lepers,^  and  the 
restoration  of  Malchus's  mutilated  ear.^ 

4.  Luke  alone  quotes  the  proverb  from 
the  lips  of  Jesus,  "Physician,  heal  thy- 
self";^ and  he  tells  us  that  Jesus  declared 
that  this  title  of  "Physician"  would  be 
popularly  applied  to  him  in  his  work. 

5.  Luke  is  more  circumstantial  in  his 
description  of  diseases  than  any  other 
writer  in  the  New  Testament,  as  in  Luke 
4.  8;  5.  12;  22.  44;  Acts  3.  7;  9.  18;  10.  9,  10; 
12.  23;  28.  8. 

6.  Luke  frequently  gives  us  the  symp- 
toms of  disease  and  the  duration  of  the 
sickness,  and  marks  for  us  the  stages  of 
the  patient's  recovery.  He  seems  to  dis- 
tinguish between  cases  of  possession  and 
ordinary  forms  of  physical  infirmity,  as  in 
6.  17,  18. 

7.  It  has  been  noted  that  the  Gospel  of 
the  physician  is  also  the  Gospel  of  the 
psychologist.  Where  Mark  tells  us  only 
about   outward    actions   and    looks,    Luke 

»  14.  1-6.  2  17.  11-19.  '  22.  51.  *4.  23. 


104  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

makes  some  comment  concerning  the  men- 
tal attitude  involved,  as  in  3.  15;  6.  11; 
7.  39.  A  skillful  physician  will  look  beyond 
external  symptoms  to  the  mental  phe- 
nomena. It  is  characteristic  of  our  own 
age  that  more  attention  than  formerly 
was  believed  necessary  is  now  given  to  the 
state  of  the  mind  in  the  treatment  of  all 
disease.  But  all  first-class  physicians  have 
always  been  more  or  less  interested  in 
psychology  as  an  aid  in  their  work;  and 
Luke  appears  to  have  belonged  in  this 
class. 

Strange  and  unexpected  touches  occur  in 
Luke's  narrative,  corresponding  to  the  as- 
tonishing and  inexplicable  psychological  ex- 
periences of  ordinary  life.  Peter  is  amazed 
at  the  wonder-working  power  displayed  by 
the  Lord  in  the  miraculous  draught  of 
fishes,  and  he  is  never  more  determined  to 
cleave  to  this  new  Master  through  sun- 
shine and  storm.  Yet  what  does  he  do  ? 
The  most  foolish  and  inexplicable  thing. 
He  falls  at  the  knees  of  Jesus  and  cries, 
* 'Depart  from  me;  for  I  am  a  sinful  man. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  105 

O  Lord."^  How  could  Jesus  depart  from 
him  ?  They  were  in  a  boat,  out  on  the 
water.  It  was  not  convenient  for  anyone 
to  leave  that  boat  just  at  that  moment. 
Moreover,  Peter  did  not  wish  for  Jesus  to 
depart  anyway.  It  would  have  been 
more  becoming  for  him  to  go  away,  if  any- 
body had  to  leave,  than  for  him  to  order 
the  Master  to  depart  from  him.  It  was 
all  utterly  foolish  and  inexcusable,  just  as 
the  psychological  processes  of  such  a  mind 
as  Peter's  so  often  are. 

The  risen  Lord  appeared  among  his  dis- 
ciples, and  showed  them  his  hands  and  his 
feet,  that  they  might  be  convinced  of  his 
identity.  It  is  Luke  who  puts  down  that 
extraordinary  statement  at  that  point. 
"They  yet  believed  not  for  joy."^  What 
a  natural  touch  that  was!  They  believed 
it,  and  yet  it  was  too  good  to  be  true. 

The  Lord  had  ascended  into  heaven,  and 
the  disciples  were  to  see  him  no  more. 
Luke  makes  that  statement  of  fact  and 
then  ends  the  book  with  the  astonishing 

1  5.  8,;9.  2  24.  41. 


106  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

comment  that  the  disciples  "worshiped 
him,  and  returned  to  Jerusalem  with  great 
joy:  and  were  continually  in  the  temple, 
blessing  God."^  No  loud  lamentation,  no 
rending  of  their  garments,  no  forty-day 
period  of  mourning;  nothing  but  praise  and 

joy! 

8.  There  is  an  indication  that  the  writer 
of  the  third  Gospel  and  the  book  of  Acts 
is  a  physician  which  is  all-sufficient  in 
itself,  and  which  has  seemed  to  most 
people  to  be  altogether  conclusive  in  the 
matter.  These  books  are  filled  with  tech- 
nical medical  terms,  such  as  can  be  paral- 
leled only  in  the  writings  of  men  in  the 
medical  profession  itself.  The  Rev.  W.  K. 
Hobart  has  written  a  volume  of  more  than 
three  hundred  pages  entitled  The  Medical 
Language  of  Luke,  in  which  he  has  made  a 
list  of  some  four  hundred  terms  used  more 
frequently  by  Luke  than  by  others,  or 
used  by  Luke  alone  among  the  writers  of 
the  New  Testament,  and  found  also  in  the 
Greek  medical  writers.     Some  of  these  are 

1  24.  52,  53. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  107 

purely  technical  terms,  not  likely  to  be 
in  use  anywhere  except  in  professional  cir- 
cles.^ In  18.  25,  where  Mark  and  Matthew 
have  the  more  common  word  for  "needle," 
pacpig,  Luke  uses  the  word  for  the  surgical 
needle,  peXovq.  In  Acts  13.  11  Luke  uses 
a  word  for  a  disease  of  the  eye,  occurring 
frequently  in  Galen,  but  found  nowhere 
else  in  our  New  Testament  or  the  Septua- 
gint,  axXvq. 

Of  course,  all  people  are  apt  to  use  med- 
ical phraseology  sometimes.  The  apostle 
Paul  has  many  medical  metaphors  in  his 
epistles.  It  has  been  an  interesting  subject 
for  discussion  and  investigation  as  to  how 
far  Paul's  companionship  with  Luke  the 
physician  may  have  been  responsible  for 
these  medical  terms  in  his  usage.  How- 
ever, no  one  is  apt  to  use  these  medical 
terms  and  phrases  continually  except  a 
medical  man.  Such  a  man  will  use  them, 
not  only  in  the  technical  description  of 
disease,  but  even  in  reference  to  the  affairs 
of  ordinary  life.     Now,  the  abundance  of 

»4.  38,  39;  16.  19-26. 


108  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

the  medical  terms  in  the  third  Gospel 
distinguishes  it  from  all  the  others  as  the 
work  of  a  physician,  and  nearly  one  hun- 
dred of  these  terms  are  such  as  only  a 
physician  might  be  expected  to  use. 

Harnack  gives  pages  of  evidence  on  this 
subject  which  he  sums  up  in  these  words: 
"When  a  physician  writes  a  historical  work 
it  does  not  necessarily  follow  that  his  pro- 
fession shows  itself  in  his  writing;  yet  it 
is  only  natural  for  one  to  look  for  traces 
of  the  author's  medical  profession  in  such 
a  work.  These  traces  may  be  of  different 
kinds:  (1)  the  whole  character  of  the  nar- 
rative may  be  determined  by  points  of 
view,  aims,  and  ideals  which  are  more  or 
less  medical  (disease  and  its  treatment); 
(2)  marked  preference  may  be  shown  for 
stories  concerning  the  healing  of  diseases, 
which  stories  may  be  given  in  great  number 
and  detail;  (3)  the  language  may  be  col- 
ored by  the  language  of  physicians  (medical 
technical  terms,  metaphors  of  medical  char- 
acter, etc.).  All  these  three  groups  of 
characteristic  signs  are  found   in   the  his- 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  109 

torical  work  which  bears  the  name  of 
Luke.  Here,  however,  it  may  be  objected 
that  the  subject-matter  itself  is  responsible 
for  these  traits,  so  that  their  evidence  is 
not  decisive  for  the  medical  calling  of  the 
author.  Jesus  appeared  as  a  great  physi- 
cian and  healer.  All  the  evangelists  say 
this  of  him;  hence  it  is  not  surprising  that 
one  of  them  has  set  this  phase  of  his  min- 
istry in  the  foreground,  and  has  regarded 
it  as  the  most  important.  Our  evangelist 
need  not,  therefore,  have  been  a  physician, 
especially  if  he  were  a  Greek,  seeing  that  in 
those  days  Greeks  with  religious  interests 
were  disposed  to  regard  religion  mainly 
under  the  category  of  healing  and  salva- 
tion. This  is  true;  yet  such  a  combination 
of  characteristic  signs  will  compel  us  to 
believe  that  the  author  was  a  physician  if 
(4)  the  description  of  the  particular  cases 
of  disease  shows  distinct  traces  of  medical 
diagnosis  and  scientific  knowledge;  (5)  if 
the  language,  even  where  questions  of 
medicine  or  of  healing  are  not  touched 
upon,   is  colored  by  medical  phraseology; 


110  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

and  (6)  if  in  those  passages  where  the  author 
speaks  as  an  eyewitness  medical  traits 
are  especially  and  prominently  apparent. 
These  three  kinds  of  tokens  are  also  found 
in  the  historical  work  of  our  author.  It  is, 
accordingly,  proved  that  it  proceeds  from 
the  pen  of  a  physician."^  This  puts  the 
truth  as  clearly  as  it  may  be  stated.  Those 
who  are  interested  in  the  proof  in  detail 
will  find  it  in  the  pages  of  Hobart  and 
Harnack. 

9.  With  these  facts  in  mind  it  is  interest- 
ing to  notice  one  difference  between  Mark's 
account  and  Luke's  account  of  the  woman 
who  was  healed  by  touching  the  hem  of 
the  garment  of  Jesus.  Mark  tells  us  that 
"she  had  suffered  many  things  of  many 
physicians,  and  had  spent  all  that  she  had, 
and  was  nothing  bettered,  but  rather  grew 
worse. "^  That,  surely,  is  a  bad  showing  for 
the  medical  profession.  Would  Luke  be 
likely  to  write  down  such  an  indictment  of 
his  own  calling  in  life  ?  We  turn  to  his  ac- 
count^  and   we  find   that  in  the   Vatican 


»  Harnack,  Luke  the  Physician,  pp.  175,  176.         «  5.  25,  26.  =  g.  43. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  111 

manuscript  and  the  Westcott  and  Hort 
text  and  the  margin  of  the  Revised  Ver- 
sion Luke  omits  all  these  severe  reflections 
upon  the  physicians  and  contents  himself 
with  the  simple  statement,  "She  was  not 
able  to  be  healed  by  any."  This  is  hardly 
an  adequate  translation.  What  Luke  really 
means  to  say  is  that  the  woman  lacked  all 
vital  energy  in  herself,  so  that  she  seemed 
to  be  beyond  the  hope  of  any  favorable 
response  to  medical  treatment.  It  was  a 
case  of  chronic  debility  so  pronounced  that 
nothing  seemed  to  be  left  for  a  physician  to 
build  upon.  It  was  not  the  fault  of  the 
physicians  that  she  could  not  be  cured.  It 
was  her  own  condition  that  seemed  in- 
curable. Luke,  the  physician,  would  not 
have  been  likely  to  write  any  of  those 
things  recorded  by  Mark.  Some  of  the 
old  manuscripts  retain  the  clause  in  the 
text  of  Luke,  "and  she  had  spent  all  her 
living  upon  physicians,"  but  it  is  better  to 
omit  it,  as  Westcott  and  Hort  have  done. 

10.  We  notice  in  closing  this  list  of  the 
evidences  in  the  writings  of  Luke  that  they 


112  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

are  the  product  of  one  who  represents  the 
point  of  view  of  the  medical  profession, 
that  almost  the  last  words  Luke  has 
written  at  the  close  of  the  book  of  Acts 
consist  of  a  quotation  from  Isaiah  ending 
with  the  words,  "and  I  will  heal  them."^ 
It  is  the  healing  power  of  Jehovah 
upon  which  he  lays  emphasis  last.  Here, 
then,  we  have  a  list  of  ten  of  the  direct 
evidences  of  his  professional  calling  to  be 
found  in  the  writings  of  Luke.  They  are 
cumulative  in  effect,  and,  taking  them  all 
together,  we  are  disposed  to  be  exceedingly 
glad  that  one  of  our  Gospels  was  written 
by  a  Gentile,  and  that  he  was  an  educated 
man  and  that  his  profession  was  that  of  a 
physician. 

When  we  turn  from  the  direct  evidences 
to  those  which  are  more  indirect  we  find 
this  feeling  enhanced.  A  physician,  like 
an  evangelist  or  any  true  minister  of  the 
gospel,  must  be  no  respecter  of  persons. 
He  must  be  interested  in  all  classes  alike, 
and  must  devote  himself  to  the  helping  and 

>  28.  27. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  113 

healing  of  all.  But  there  is  one  class  in 
which  the  physician  as  a  professional  man 
is  more  interested  than  the  lawyer  or  the 
preacher  or  any  other  servant  of  society. 
That  is  the  class  of  the  very  young. 

The  physician  ought  to  be  expert  in  the 
diseases  of  infancy.  It  is  a  part  of  his  duty 
to  help  the  little  ones  through  the  period  of 
their  greatest  helplessness  and  infirmity 
into  good  health  and  vigorous  physical  life. 
The  sympathy  and  love  of  the  physician's 
heart  goes  out  continually  to  the  innocent 
and  helpless  lambs  of  the  flock.  Now,  it 
surely  is  characteristic  of  the  third  Gospel 
that  more  than  the  others  it  is  interested 
in  the  little  folks. 

VII.  The  Gospel  of  Childhood 

1.  Luke  alone  tells  us  about  the  birth 
and  infancy  of  John  the  Baptist,  and  all 
the  marvels  connected  with  it,  the  annun- 
ciation to  Zacharias  in  the  temple,  the 
paralysis  of  the  tongue  of  that  unbeliever, 
the  miraculous  quickening  of  Elisabeth  in 
her  old  age,  the  restoration  of  the  power  of 


114  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

speech  to  Zacharias  at  the  time  of  the 
birth  of  his  son,  and  the  use  he  made  of  it 
in  singing  a  psalm  of  praise  to  God.  This 
birth  in  old  age,  this  temporary  dumb- 
ness, and  this  loosening  of  a  paralyzed 
tongue  are  all  of  interest  to  the  physician 
as  well  as  to  the  writer  of  the  gospel  his- 
tory. 

2.  Matthew  tells  us  something  about  the 
birth  of  Jesus,  but  Luke  adds  the  story 
of  the  annunciation  to  Mary,  the  visit  to 
Elisabeth,  the  singing  of  the  Magnificat, 
the  heralding  of  the  heavenly  host,  the 
visit  of  the  shepherds,  the  circumcision, 
the  purification,  the  meeting  with  Simeon 
and  Anna,  the  child's  growth  in  wisdom 
and  stature  and  grace,  and  the  twelve- 
year-old  boy's  interest  in  the  temple  and 
its  teachers  of  the  law. 

3.  Mark  and  Matthew  told  us  how  they 
brought  little  children  to  Jesus,  but  Luke 
tells  us  that  these  little  ones  were  babes, 
Td  PQEfpT).  They  were  innocent,  helpless, 
clinging,  dependent,  trustful  infants  in 
their  mothers'  arms  of  whom  Jesus  said, 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  115 

*'To  such  belongeth  the  kingdom  of  God."^ 
The  first  two  chapters  of  the  third  Gospel 
will  always  be  the  chapters  we  will  most 
delight  to  read  to  the  children  and  the 
chapters  which  the  children  will  be  most 
delighted  to  hear.  They  will  always  love 
best  the  Gospel  with  the  story  of  the  shep- 
herds and  the  angels,  the  Gospel  which 
tells  how  Jesus  allowed  the  mothers  to 
bring  their  babies  to  him,  the  Gospel 
written  by  the  beloved  physician  who 
loved  the  little  folks  and  so  thought  it 
worth  while  to  write  a  part  of  his  story 
for  them. 

VIII.  The  Gospel  of  Womanhood 

A  physician  because  of  his  profession  is 
brought  into  more  confidential  relations 
with  women  than  any  other  professional 
man  is  likely  to  be.  A  lawyer  probably 
will  deal  most  of  the  time  with  men.  A 
minister  ought  to  be  interested  equally  in 
the  men  and  the  women  of  his  community. 
But    since,    apart    from    helpless    infancy, 

I  Luke  18.  15-17. 


116  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

woman  physically  is  the  weaker  vessel,  a 
physician  is  apt  to  find  that  the  most  of 
his  time  and  attention  is  occupied  with  the 
care  of  women  and  children;  and  if  he  is  of 
a  naturally  kindly  disposition  he  will  find 
his  sympathies  going  out  to  these  in  large 
measure,  and  as  he  becomes  beloved  and 
trusted,  he  will  find  that  their  confidence 
is  given  to  him  as  to  no  other  professional 
man.  The  third  Gospel  has  many  items  of 
intimate  information  concerning  women 
which  may  have  come  to  Luke  in  this 
way.  There  is  such  a  number  of  these 
that  the  third  Gospel  has  come  to  be  called 
the  "Gospel  of  Womanhood."  We  note 
some  of  the  reasons  for  giving  it  this  title. 

1.  Luke  tells  us  more  about  women  than 
the  other  synoptics  combined.  The  word 
yvvrj,  "woman,"  occurs  in  Mark  and  Mat- 
thew forty-nine  times,  and  in  Luke  alone 
forty-three  times,  almost  as  many  times  as 
in  the  two  others  put  together.  The  pages 
of  this  Gospel  are  filled  with  the  figures  of 
women,  and  some  of  them  are  not  to  be 
found  in  the  other  Gospels  at  all. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  117 

2.  We  are  indebted  to  Luke  alone  for 
much   of   our   information   concerning   the 
Virgin  Mary.     The  old  tradition  which  de- 
clared that  Luke  was  a  painter,  and  that 
he  had  painted  the  portrait  of  the  Virgin 
Mary,  was  not  so  far  wrong  after  all,  for  it 
is  from  the  pages  of  Luke  that  we  are  able 
to  reproduce  any  satisfying  portrait  of  the 
Virgin  Mary  to-day.     Mark  mentioned  her 
name,    and    Matthew    told    us    something 
about   the   trouble   she   had   with   Joseph, 
who  was  minded  to  put  her  away;  but  it  is 
in  Luke's  narrative  alone  that  we  are  per- 
mitted to  see    the    events    circling    about 
the  birth  of  the  God-Man  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  human  mother  involved  in  the 
great  mystery.     Luke  alone  tells  us  about 
the  annunciation  to  Mary,  and  we  have  a 
glimpse   of   that   moment   of  transcendent 
revelation  to  the  Virgin  who  was  to  bear  a 
Child,  some  inkling  of  the  profound  per- 
plexity   into    which    she    was    inevitably 
thrown,   some   conception  of  the  absolute 
subhmity  of  self-surrender  to  that  sword 
which  was  to  pierce  her  soul  and  to  that 


118  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

exaltation    over    all    womankind    forever- 
more. 

Luke  has  pictured  for  us  Mary  the  maid 
and  Mary  the  mother  as  the  type  of  per- 
fect womanhood.  She  has  been  worshiped 
by  multitudes  of  Christians,  and  she  has 
been  reverenced  by  all  the  disciples  of 
Jesus  as  the  pure  Virgin  who  bore  our 
Lord  and  the  saintly  mother  who  trained 
the  Child  in  the  ways  of  righteousness  in 
the  Nazareth  home.  In  Luke  we  see  Mary 
hastening  away  to  her  kinswoman,  Elisa- 
beth, that  she  may  pour  into  the  ear  of 
that  older  and  trusted  friend  all  her  tale 
of  high  favor  and  great  grief.  In  Luke  we 
hear  Mary  singing  the  Magnificat,  that 
spontaneous  outburst  of  the  maiden's  over- 
flowing thanksgiving  to  God: 

My  soul  doth  magnify  the  Lord, 

And  my  spirit  hath  rejoiced  in  God  my  Saviour. 

For  he  hath  looked  upon  the  low  estate  of   his 

handmaid : 
For  behold,  from  henceforth  all  generations  shall 

call  me  blessed.* 

U.  46-48. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  119 

In  Luke  alone  we  have  a  glimpse  of  the 
mother  laying  the  Child  in  the  manger 
and  receiving  the  shepherds  with  modest 
dignity  and  listening  to  their  tale  of  angel 
messages  and  songs,  and  then  treasuring 
these  things  in  her  heart  through  all  the 
long  days  and  years.  In  Luke  we  see  her 
in  the  temple,  bringing  the  appointed  sac- 
rifice of  the  poor,  and  meeting  Simeon  and 
Anna,  and  hearing  the  prophecy  of  her 
own  woe  and  the  redemption  to  be  accom- 
plished through  her  son.  In  Luke  we  read 
of  Mary  searching  through  the  caravan 
and  then  through  the  sacred  city  for  the 
twelve-year-old  Boy  who  had  strangely 
disappeared,  but  who  told  her  when  he 
had  been  discovered  that  the  temple  was 
the  only  place  in  which  they  need  have 
looked  for  him.  Then  we  read  again  that 
Mary  kept  all  these  sayings  in  her  heart. 

Tradition  said  that  Luke  painted  the 
portrait  of  Mary  and  carried  it  with  him 
in  his  evangelistic  labors,  and  that  miracles 
were  wrought  by  means  of  it,  and  that  it 
greatly  helped   him   in   his  preaching.     It 


120  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

has  been  an  aid  to  gospel  preaching  through 
all  the  centuries  that  Luke  has  given  us  in 
this  book  the  picture  of  this  maid  and 
mother  who  serves  as  a  type  of  model 
womanhood.  But  there  are  other  women  in 
these  pages  besides  this  mother  of  our  Lord. 

3.  Luke  tells  us  all  that  we  know  about 
the  cousin  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  the  saintly 
Elisabeth,  the  one  to  whom  the  Virgin 
turned  first  for  confidence  and  consolation 
in  the  hour  of  her  great  trouble  and  joy. 

4.  Luke  tells  us  about  the  saintly  proph- 
etess Anna,  one  of  the  quiet  of  the  land, 
worshiping  and  fasting  and  praying  night 
and  day  in  the  temple  and  waiting  for  the 
coming  of  the  Lord.  There  they  stand  in 
those  first  two  chapters:  the  saintly  Virgin, 
the  saintly  wife,  and  the  saintly  widow — 
Mary,  Elisabeth,  Anna — bearing  their  wit- 
ness that  now  a  new  gospel  to  saintly 
womanhood  had  come  into  the  world. 

5.  Luke  tells  us  of  that  company  of 
women  who  ministered  of  their  substance 
to  the  twelve  and  their  Master,  because 
they  had  been  healed  of  evil  spirits  and 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  121 

infirmities — Mary  of  Magdala,  Joanna,  Su- 
sanna, and  many  others.^  It  is  Luke 
alone  who  gives  us  this  picture  of  Jesus, 
"accompanied  in  his  mission  journeys — not 
by  warriors  like  David,  not  by  elders  like 
Moses,  not  by  kings  and  princes  like  the 
Herods — but  by  a  most  humble  band  of 
ministering  women. "^  "The  Teacher  who 
included  in  his  church  the  humble,  the  dis- 
tressed, and  the  repentant,  is  attended  by 
the  weak  and  loving  rather  than  by  a 
council  of  elders,  a  band  of  warriors,  or  a 
school  of  prophets."^  "The  scribes  and 
Pharisees  gathered  up  their  robes  in  the 
streets  and  the  synagogues,  lest  they  should 
touch  a  woman,  and  held  it  a  crime  to  look 
on  an  unveiled  woman  in  public;  our 
Lord  suffered  a  woman  to  minister  to  him 
out  of  whom  he  had  cast  seven  devils."^ 

6.  Luke  has  given  us  that  picture  of  the 
visit  of  Jesus  to  the  home  of  Martha  and 
Mary,  and  a  glimpse  at  the  typically  differ- 
ent characters  of  those  two  sister  disciples.^ 

18.  2,  3.         ^Farrar,  Messages  of  the  Books,  p.  81. 

»  Bishop  Westcott.       *  Schaff,  op.  cit.,  p.  663.  ^  10.  38^2. 


122  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

7.  Luke  tells  us  of  the  widow  of  Nain 
and  how  the  coming  of  Jesus  turned  her 
mourning  into  joy.  The  Lord  had  com- 
passion upon  her  and  said  to  her,  **Weep 
not."^ 

8.  The  evangelist  Luke  has  recorded  the 
parable  of  the  importunate  widow  and  the 
unjust  judge.^  These  three  widows — Anna, 
praying  in  the  temple;  the  weeping  widow 
at  Nain;  the  impatient,  persistent,  pestif- 
erous widow  of  the  parable — appear  in  the 
third  Gospel  alone  and  are  in  themselves 
sufficient  to  make  this  "Gospel  of  Woman- 
hood" a  "Gospel  of  Widowhood"  as  well. 
A  worshiping  widow,  a  weeping  widow,  a 
wrangling  widow;  a  saintly  widow,  a  sor- 
rowing widow,  an  insufferable  widow;  a 
widow  eighty-four  years  in  saintly  and 
patient  expectation  of  the  coming  of  her 
Lord,  an  unfortunate  widow  mourning  the 
loss  of  her  only  son,  an  importunate  widow 
in  as  full  contrast  with  the  quiet  and 
patient  saints  of  the  Lord  as  the  unjust 
judge  is  in  contrast  with  the  loving  and 

» 7.  11-15.  2  18.  1-8. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  123 

patient  Father  of  all.    We  owe  the  pictures 
of  these  three  widows  to  Luke  alone. 

9.  Luke  tells  us  of  the  healing  of  that 
daughter  of  Abraham,  whom  Satan  had 
bound  for  eighteen  years.^  The  ruler  of 
the  synagogue  was  moved  with  great  in- 
dignation that  day,  but  Jesus  lifted  the 
burden  from  that  woman's  shoulders,  loos- 
ened the  bonds  that  had  bowed  her  to- 
gether for  years,  and  permitted  her  to 
stand  straight  and  glorify  God  before 
them  all.  The  miracle  might  be  taken  as 
a  parable  of  the  change  Christianity  has 
wrought  in  the  condition  of  womanhood 
in  the  world.  Woman  is  no  longer  bound 
and  bowed;  at  the  word  of  Jesus  she  stands 
straight.  Wherever  the  ministry  of  Jesus 
has  come  she  has  been  made  to  glorify 
God. 

10.  Luke  has  given  us  that  story  of  the 
anointing  of  Jesus  by  the  woman  who  had 
been  a  sinner,  at  the  feast  in  the  house  of 
Simon  the  Pharisee.-  Could  we  lose  out 
of  the  gospel  story  the  parable  of  the  two 

»  13.  10-17.  »7.  36-50. 


124  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

debtors  and  this  whole  picture  of  the  rela- 
tion between  our  compassionate  Lord  and 
all  truly  repentant  souls  ?  This  woman  had 
sinned,  but  her  love  had  won  forgiveness; 
she  had  sinned,  but  his  love  had  made  her 
clean.  He  accepted  the  sacrifice  her  affec- 
tion was  so  willing  to  make;  he  did  not 
repulse  her  before  the  throng;  he  acknowl- 
edged their  previous  relationship;  he  prom- 
ised her  that  she  might  go  in  peace.  There 
is  all  the  union  of  purity  and  compassion, 
of  dignity  and  genuine  affection  which  we 
would  expect  to  find  in  the  loving  Saviour 
of  men.  Luke  alone  has  given  us  this 
narrative.^ 

11.  In  the  other  Gospels  we  read  how 
Jesus  defended  himself  against  the  blas- 
phemous charge  of  the  Pharisees  that  he 
was  in  league  with  Beelzebub,  but  it  is 
Luke  alone  who  records  the  fact  that  at 
the  close  of  that  defense  some  warm- 
hearted woman  in  the  throng  lifted  up  her 
voice  impulsively  in  defiance  of  his  ene- 


•  For  the  reasons  for  concluding  that  this  narrative  has  no  parallel  in  the 
other  Gospels,  see  Andrews,  The  Life  of  Our  Lord,  pp.  281-286. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  125 

mies  and  in  utter  loyalty  to  him,  saying, 
"Blessed  is  the  womb  that  bare  thee,  and 
the  breasts  which  thou  didst  suck."^  It 
was  a  blessing  pronounced  upon  Mary  the 
mother,  but  it  was  a  woman's  tribute  to 
the  greatness  and  the  goodness  of  Mary's 
Son. 

12.  Luke  tells  us  that  on  the  way  to  the 
cross  a  multitude  of  women  followed  him, 
weeping  and  lamenting  his  fate;  but  Jesus 
turned  to  them  and  said,  "Daughters  of 
Jerusalem,  weep  not  for  me,  but  weep  for 
yourselves  and  your  children."^  His  com- 
passion for  the  women  and  for  the  little 
ones  was  dominant  within  him  to  the  very 
last. 

13.  Epiphanius  tells  us  that  in  Marcion's 
version  of  the  Gospel  according  to  Luke  he 
had  inserted  as  a  part  of  the  charge  made 
by  the  Jews  against  Jesus  in  the  trial  be- 
fore Pilate,  "This  man  perverts  the  women 
and  the  children."  The  insertion  bears 
its  witness  to  the  attraction  which  the 
personality  of  Jesus  must  have  always  had 

»  11.  27.  2  23.  27,  28. 


126  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

for  these  more  dependent  classes  of  so- 
ciety. The  children  loved  him  and  followed 
him.  The  women  ministered  to  him  gladly 
of  their  substance.  Doubtless  there  were 
some  of  the  Jews  who  thought  it  would  be 
better  for  their  wives  to  stay  at  home  and 
to  learn  from  their  husbands  in  silence  and 
seclusion  and  subjection  there  rather  than 
to  be  running  about  the  country  after  this 
new  teacher  and  squandering  their  means 
in  the  support  of  him  and  his  able-bodied 
but  idle  attendants.  Doubtless  there  were 
some  fathers  who  wondered  why  their  chil- 
dren did  not  run  to  them  so  gladly  and 
listen  to  them  so  eagerly  as  they  did  to 
this  stranger;  and  it  must  have  seemed  to 
them  that  their  families  were  being  per- 
verted, and  it  would  be  just  as  well  for  this 
man  to  be  put  out  of  the  way.  They  were 
right  in  thinking  that  a  revolution  was 
impending  in  those  days.  They  were 
wrong  in  thinking  that  the  death  of  Jesus 
would  put  an  end  to  it. 

The  rights  of  childhood  had  been  recog- 
nized once  for  all.     The  emancipation  of 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  127 

womanhood  had  been  proclaimed  for  all 
time  to  come.  The  Saviour  of  the  world 
was  to  be  the  Saviour  of  women  and  the 
Saviour  of  the  little  ones.  Henceforth  they 
would  follow  him  into  the  kingdom  of  God. 
The  beloved  physician  has  given  us  in  his 
Gospel  this  picture  of  the  compassionate 
Christ,  interested  like  himself  in  these 
weaker  and  more  helpless  members  of 
society,  and  beloved  like  himself  by  those 
to  whom  he  gave  his  ceaseless  sympathy 
and  service. 

IX.  The  Gospel  for  the  Poor 

A  good  physician  is  ready  to  respond  to 
any  cry  of  need.  His  professional  knowl- 
edge is  at  the  service  of  all.  He  can  be  no 
respecter  of  persons  in  his  practice.  He 
must  give  as  much  attention  to  the  needs 
of  his  poor  patients  as  he  does  to  the  rich. 
A  beloved  physician  will  be  a  philanthro- 
pist, a  lover  of  man  as  man.  The  physician 
who  works  only  for  fat  fees  and  who  goes 
only  when  summoned  by  the  well-to-do 
may  make  his  fortune,  but  he  will  miss 


128  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

his  greatest  professional  opportunity  in  the 
service  of  the  poor.  The  poor  people  are 
in  the  majority,  and  when  they  are  sick 
their  need  of  a  good  physician  is  greater 
than  that  of  the  comfortably  rich.  With 
unskillful  nursing  and  unsanitary  surround- 
ings and  unwholesome  food  all  the  resources 
of  the  physician  are  taxed  to  the  utmost  to 
save  the  life;  and  a  good  physician  finds 
that  his  sympathies  are  poured  out  in  the 
effort  to  help  the  needy  poor. 

Luke  was  such  a  good  physician.  He  lived 
and  died  a  poor  man,  and  he  gave  the  most 
of  his  service  to  the  poor.  He  is  naturally 
interested  to  show  that  the  gospel  news  he 
has  to  record  is  of  immediate  concern  to 
the  most  needy  classes,  and  among  these 
to  the  humble  and  the  poor.  He  says  so 
much  about  these  that  this  third  Gospel 
has  been  called  the  Gospel  of  the  Ebion- 
ites,  the  Ebionites  deriving  their  name 
from  the  Hebrew  word  Ehion,  "poor." 
Let  us  notice  a  few  of  the  facts  which  lead 
to  such  a  conclusion. 

1.  The  angel  Gabriel  is  sent  to  make  the 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  129 

annunciation  of  the  Messiah's  birth,  not 
to  any  royal  palace,  not  to  any  mansion  of 
the  rich,  but  to  a  plainly  furnished  and 
poverty-stricken  peasant's  home.  There  to 
a  humble  maiden  of  the  multitude  of  the 
poor  in  the  land  was  his  message  given 
that  the  Messias  would  come.  Luke  alone 
has  recorded  that  scene. ^ 

2.  Mary  went  to  see  her  kinswoman, 
Elisabeth,  and  there  she  sang  her  Mag- 
nificat : 

He  hath  put  down  princes  from  their  thrones, 
And  hath  exalted  them  of  low  degree. 
The  hungry  he  hath  filled  with  good  things; 
And  the  rich  he  hath  sent  empty  away.^ 

Luke  alone  has  recorded  the  song. 

3.  Luke  alone  tells  us  how  this  mar- 
velous birth  took  place.  He  says  that 
the  Saviour  was  born  in  a  stable.  He 
says  that  the  Messias  was  laid  in  a 
manger.  He  says  that  the  Incarnate  God 
could  find  no  room  in  the  inn.^  Was  this 
the  way  for  the  King  of  kings  and  the  Lord 
of  lords  to  enter  upon  his  inheritance  ? 

»  i.  26-38.  2 1.  52,  53.  J  '  2.  7. 


130  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

On  the  fifth  of  September,  1639,  a  son 
was  born  to  Louis  XIII,  king  of  France. 
The  birth  took  place  at  the  castle  of  Saint 
Germain,  where  Anne  of  Austria,  queen  of 
France,  then  resided.  For  weeks  before 
the  neighboring  town  had  been  crowded 
with  the  noble  and  the  great,  who  were 
impatiently  waiting  the  wished-for  event. 
Every  avenue  up  to  the  palace  was 
thronged  with  the  anxious  and  interested 
people.  On  that  day,  the  fifth  of  Septem- 
ber, the  king  summoned  into  his  private 
apartment  the  princes  and  the  princesses 
of  the  blood  royal.  In  the  next  room  the 
bishops  of  Lisieux,  Meaux,  and  Beauvais 
were  stationed.  Across  the  hallway  were  the 
officers  of  state  and  ladies  of  rank  sufficient 
to  give  them  the  right  of  entrance  to  the 
royal  palace.  At  last  the  nurse  appeared 
with  the  newborn  son,  afterward  Louis  the 
XlVth  of  France.  The  father  took  the 
infant  child  and  held  it  up  at  the  window 
where  the  waiting  crowd  might  see.  They 
shouted  aloud  their  joy  while  the  happy 
king  carried  the  baby  prince  into  the  room 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  131 

where  the  bishops  were  offering  up 
prayers,  and  the  boy  was  baptized  by  the 
Bishop  of  Meaux  in  the  presence  of  all 
the  great  dignitaries  of  the  kingdom.  The 
news  was  at  once  dispatched  to  the  city 
of  Paris,  and  the  great  capital  celebrated 
the  event  with  magnificent  festivities.  In 
due  time  there  arrived  a  nuncio  extraor- 
dinary from  the  Pope,  with  swaddling 
clothes  blessed  by  "His  Holiness"  there  at 
Rome  and  sent  to  the  Dauphin  of  France 
as  one  of  the  elder  sons  of  the  church. 
Those  swaddling  clothes  were  laid  in  two 
chests  of  red  velvet  and  were  sparkling 
with  silver  and  gold.  A  sovereign  prince 
had  been  born,  the  heir  to  one  of  Europe's 
foremost  thrones,  and  round  about  this 
royal  birth  were  gathered  the  pomp  and 
pageantry,  the  imposing  ceremony  and 
regal  luxury  that  befitted  the  welcoming 
of  him  who  was  to  be  the  king. 

Luke  alone  has  told  us  how  the  world 
welcomed  the  coming  of  him  who  was  to 
be  the  King  of  kings  on  that  night  of  his 
birth   in  Bethlehem.     Bethlehem  took  no 


132  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

notice;  it  was  interested  in  far  different 
things.  The  capital  city,  Jerusalem,  knew 
nothing  about  it  and  did  not  care.  The 
ecclesiastical  authorities  were  busied  about 
other  matters.  The  noble  and  the  great, 
the  wealthy  and  the  influential,  were  sound 
asleep  and  utterly  unconscious  of  any  great 
event.  The  people  in  the  inn  were  making 
the  best  of  their  crowded  quarters  and  were 
snoring  their  satisfaction  that  they  could 
get  lodgings  at  such  a  time  as  this. 

There  was  nobody  out  in  the  stable 
except  that  poor  maid  who  had  come  too 
late  or  who  was  too  poor  to  procure  any 
room  in  the  inn.  There  among  the  stable 
smells  Jesus  was  born,  and  they  laid  him 
to  rest  in  the  manger,  a  little  nest  of  a  bed 
having  been  hollowed  out  for  him  in  the 
cattle  straw.  There  were  no  swaddling 
clothes  there,  blessed  by  high  dignitaries 
and  sparkling  with  jewels.  His  swaddling 
clothes  were  such  as  that  poor  mother 
could  furnish  in  the  hour  of  her  need. 
Matthew  tells  about  the  coming  of  Wise 
Men  from  the  East,  bringing  rich  presents 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  133 

of  gold  and  frankincense  and  myrrh  and 
offering  the  homage  that  was  due  to  a 
King.  There  is  nothing  of  that  sort  in 
Luke's  narrative.  The  only  courtiers  here 
are  the  cattle.  Jesus  is  born  in  the  extrem- 
est  poverty  of  surroundings.  It  has  been 
said  that  the  shortest  biography  of  Jesus 
ever  written  was  that  in  which  the  apostle 
Paul  expressed  the  bald  fact  and  the  whole 
astonishing  truth  of  the  incarnation  in  one 
word,  enrojxevoev,  He  became  poor.^  It  is 
Luke  who  has  given  us  the  historical  setting 
for  this  assertion  in  his  story  of  the  Saviour's 
birth. 

4.  In  Matthew's  story  the  Magi  appear 
in  Jerusalem  and  make  inquiry  of  the 
king  in  his  palace  and  of  the  scribes  who 
were  the  masters  of  the  law.  The  news  is 
thus  given  in  the  capital  and  to  the  chief 
rulers  of  the  nation.  In  Luke  no  such 
public  proclamation  takes  place.  The  only 
people  who  are  told  about  this  transcendent 
mystery  of  the  incarnation  are  some  shep- 
herd lads,   keeping  watch   by   night  over 

I  2  Cor.  8.  9. 


134  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

their  flocks  on  the  Bethlehem  hills.  Those 
poor  fellows  had  no  gifts  to  bring  to  Mary 
or  to  Jesus,  but  they  heard  the  good  news 
of  great  joy  which  should  be  to  all  people 
and  they  spread  that  news  among  the  poor 
people  everywhere.^ 

5.  According  to  Luke,  who  has  made  the 
only  record  of  them,  later  revelations  were 
accorded  to  some  quiet  and  obscure  peo- 
ple, Simeon  and  Anna,^  not  to  Augustus  at 
Rome,  nor  to  Annas,  the  high  priest  at 
Jerusalem. 

6.  Luke  is  careful  to  tell  us  that  when 
the  days  of  purification  were  ended,  and 
the  parents  made  their  sacrifice  in  the 
temple,  they  offered  a  pair  of  turtledoves, 
or  two  young  pigeons,  the  sacrifice  of  the 
very  poor.^ 

7.  Luke  alone  tells  us  that  when  John 
the  Baptist  came  preaching  he  said  to  the 
multitudes,  *'He  that  hath  two  coats,  let 
him  impart  to  him  that  hath  none;  and  he 
that  hath  food,  let  him  do  likewise."^  John 
the  Baptist  believed  that  the  sharing  of 

»  2.  8-20.  2  2.  25-38.  '  2.  22-24.         <  3.  1 1. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  135 

superfluities  in  practical  philanthropy 
would  solve  the  problem  of  the  poor,  or, 
at  least,  it  would  help  to  solve  the  prob- 
lem of  the  equitable  distribution  of 
wealth. 

8.  When  Jesus  was  ready  to  begin  his 
ministry  Luke  records  his  first  sermon  in 
the  synagogue  at  Nazareth,  and  he  says  that 
the  first  words  that  Jesus  uttered  were  these: 

The  Spirit  of  the  Lord  is  upon  me, 

Because  he  anointed  me  to  preach  good  tidings  to  the  poor.^ 

According  to  Luke,  the  gospel  of  Jesus  is 
a  gospel  to  the  poor.  That  text  from 
Isaiah  was  the  fitting  motto  for  the  be- 
ginning and  the  middle  and  the  end  of  his 
ministry.  It  summarized  the  whole  of  his 
mission  to  men. 

9.  In  Luke  14.  33  we  find  Jesus  saying, 
* 'Whosoever  he  be  of  you  that  renounceth 
not  all  that  he  hath,  he  cannot  be  my 
disciple";  and  Luke  alone  has  recorded  the 
fact  that  when  Jesus  called  Peter  and 
Andrew  and  James  and  John  and  Matthew 


14.  18. 


136  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

into  his  service  they  all  of  them  left  all 
and  followed  him.^ 

10.  Where  Matthew  has  written  the 
Beatitude  of  our  Lord,  "Blessed  are  the 
poor  in  spirit,"  Luke  has  it,  "Blessed  are 
ye  poor";^  and  where  Matthew  has  writ- 
ten, "Blessed  are  they  that  hunger  and 
thirst  after  righteousness,"  Luke  has  it, 
"Blessed  are  ye  that  hunger  now:  for  ye 
shall  be  filled."^  Where  Matthew  has  only 
Beatitudes,  Luke  adds  some  "Woes" — 
"Woe  unto  you  that  are  rich!"*  and,  "Woe 
unto  you,  ye  that  are  full  now !  for  ye  shall 
hunger."^ 

11.  Luke  records  the  parable  of  Dives 
and  Lazarus,  in  which  the  poor  beggar  has 
the  advantage  at  last.^ 

12.  Luke  has  the  parable  of  the  rich  fool, 
who  labored  long  and  gained  much  and 
lost  everything  in  one  night,  including  his 
soul.^  Was  there  ever  such  a  vivid  picture 
of  utter  selfishness  put  into  so  brief  a  form  ? 
Look    at    the    possessive    pronouns,    ''my 


'5.11,28.  2  6.20.  3  6.21.  <  6.  24. 

6  6.  25.  »  16.  19-31.       ?  12.  16-21. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  137 

fruits,  my  barns,  my  grain,  my  goods,  my 
soul."  No  one  of  those  things  belonged  to 
him,  least  of  all  his  soul.  That  was  taken 
away  from  him  in  one  night,  and  then  to 
whom  did  all  the  other  things  belong  ? 
Look  at  the  personal  pronouns,  "What 
shall  I  do?  This  will  I  do.  Then  /  will 
say  to  my  soul."  He  will  say,  will  he? 
There  are  seven  of  these  future  tenses  in 
the  Greek,  all  showing  how  happy  he  is 
going  to  be  in  some  future  day.  They  are 
followed  by  six  present  tenses,  all  utterly 
selfish,  but  all  postponed  to  that  future 
day  which  never  dawned.  "I  will  say.  Eat, 
drink,  rest,  rejoice";  but  he  never  lived  to 
say  it,  much  less  really  to  do  any  of  these 
things. 

13.  Luke  also  has  that  parable  about  the 
chief  seats  at  the  feast,  closing  with  the 
promise,  *'He  that  humbleth  himself  shall 
be  exalted."^ 

14.  Luke  tells  us  of  that  great  supper  to 
which  the  "poor  and  maimed  and  blind 
and  lame"  were  invited.^    It  is  a  symbol  of 

» 14.  7-11.  2  14.  21. 


138  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

the  gospel  feast  set  forth  in  all  these  pages 
written  by  Luke.  It  is  all  for  the  poor  and 
for  the  poorest  of  the  poor.  Luke  is  ready 
to  go  out  into  the  highways  and  the  hedges 
and  constrain  these  impoverished  and  neg- 
lected ones  to  come  in.  By  way  of  con- 
trast, remember  what  Voltaire  said  to 
D'Alembert:  "We  have  never  pretended 
to  enlighten  the  cobblers  and  the  maid- 
servants. We  leave  that  for  the  apostles." 
That  is  the  work  in  which  Paul  delighted. 
That  is  the  work  to  which  Luke  devoted 
himself.  Jesus  was  anointed  to  preach  the 
gospel  to  the  poor.  The  gospel  of  his 
anointed  ones  will  be,  like  this  Gospel 
according  to  Luke,  a  gospel  of  comfort  and 
encouragement  and  salvation  to  the  poor. 
It  may  be  well  to  suggest,  before  leaving 
this  subject,  that  while  Luke  evidently  had 
an  overflowing  sympathy  for  the  poor,  his 
book  does  not  lead  us  to  think  that  he 
had  any  prejudice  against  wealth  as  such, 
any  more  than  Jesus  had.  Riches  never 
harmed  a  man  unless  he  tried  to  find  his 
happiness  in  them.    If  he  allowed  them  to 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  139 

stand  between  him  and  the  kingdom,  they 
made  him  infinitely  poor.  That  seemed  to 
be  the  case  with  the  rich  young  ruler.  He 
would  not  follow  Jesus  if  he  must  for- 
sake his  wealth.  He  preferred  earthly  sub- 
stance to  his  soul's  salvation.  That  was  a 
fatal  choice.  He  trusted  to  his  riches  for 
his  supreme  satisfaction  and  he  went  away 
sorrowful  rather  than  satisfied. 

It  was  not  because  he  was  rich  that  he 
could  not  be  saved.  It  was  because  he 
trusted  in  riches  more  than  in  a  Redeemer. 
A  poor  man  can  do  that  as  well  as  a  rich 
man.  A  poor  man  can  feel  sure  that  if 
he  had  riches  he  could  take  care  of  himself, 
and  if  he  trusts  in  riches  to  that  extent  the 
wealth  he  has  not  can  keep  him  out  of  the 
kingdom.  Jesus  said,  "Children,  how  hard 
is  it  for  them  that  trust  in  riches  to  enter  into 
the  kingdom  of  God!"  And  that  warning 
was  as  applicable  to  those  poor  disciples  as 
to  any  others.  They,  too,  must  put  their 
trust  in  God  rather  than  in  mammon,  in 
order  to  be  saved.  Wealth  never  saved  a 
man,    and    wealth    just    as    surely    never 


140  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

damned  a  man.  It  is  the  use  of  wealth 
that  determines  its  relation  to  a  man's 
character. 

1.  In  the  parable  Abraham  is  in  bliss, 
and  Abraham  presumably  was  just  as  rich 
a  man  upon  earth  as  the  rich  man  whom 
the  parable  shows  us  in  torments.  The 
difference  between  Abraham  and  Dives  was 
not  one  of  wealth,  but  one  of  character. 

2.  Luke  alone  tells  us  about  Zacchseus, 
and  we  learn  that  Zacchseus  was  a  very 
wealthy  man;  and  when  he  decides  to  keep 
half  of  his  possessions  there  is  no  hint 
that  either  Jesus  or  Luke  thought  that  he 
ought  to  have  given  up  all. 

3.  In  the  various  discussions  throughout 
the  Gospel  concerning  masters  and  servants 
there  is  no  suggestion  that  it  is  wrong  to 
have  servants,  and  in  one  passage  the 
Master  plainly  says  that  he  who  sits  at 
meat  is  superior  to  him  who  serves,^  but 
it  is  a  kind  of  superiority  which  he  himself 
does  not  desire. 

4.  Possibly  Luke  is  more  insistent  than 

» 22.  27. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  141 

either  Matthew  or  Mark  upon  the  fact 
that  Joseph  of  Arimathsea,  while  a  rich 
man  and  a  man  of  high  rank,  was  also  a 
good  and  righteous  man,  and  one  who  was 
looking  for  the  kingdom  of  God.^ 

These  indications  are  sufficient  to  show 
that  wealth  turned  to  good  uses  was  ap- 
preciated to  the  full  by  Luke  and  by  his 
Lord.  They  were  both  of  them  glad 
enough  that  there  were  some  women  who 
were  well-to-do  and  able  to  minister  of 
their  substance  to  the  Master  and  his 
apostles  in  the  days  of  their  need.  They 
preferred  to  preach  and  be  poor  themselves, 
but  they  had  no  prejudice  against  those 
who  made  money  if  they  made  good  use  of 
their  money  when  made.  They  loved  the 
poor  and  served  the  poor,  but  they  had  no 
objection  to  being  served  by  the  rich  if 
the  rich  offered  to  share  any  portion  of 
their  possessions  with  them.  They  were 
not  anarchists  or  socialists.  They  were 
preachers  of  the  gospel  to  the  poor,  a  gospel 
whose   message   was   of   equal   importance 

»  23.  50,  51. 


142  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

and  value  to  the  rich  and  to  which  the  rich 
were  equally  welcome  if  they  would  hear. 

X.  The  Gospel  for  the  Outcasts 

There  is  still  another  class  with  which 
the  physician  must  perforce  come  into  pro- 
fessional contact,  and  with  which  the 
preacher  and  the  lawyer  often  have  little 
to  do.  That  is  the  class  of  the  social  out- 
casts. It  is  surely  characteristic  of  this 
Gospel  according  to  Luke  that  its  sym- 
pathy reaches  even  to  these.  Luke  6.  35, 
in  the  margin  of  the  Revised  Version,  reads, 
Jesus  despaired  "of  no  man."  That  might 
be  made  the  text  of  the  entire  narrative. 
Luke  was  like  his  Master  again  at  this 
point.  The  brand  of  public  infamy  has  no 
weight  for  him.  His  sympathies  went  out 
to  all  who  were  in  need,  even  as  the  sympa- 
thies of  Jesus  always  had  been  manifested 
most  to  those  who  needed  them  most. 

In  the  Acts  of  Paul  and  Thecla  we  read 
that  Paul  said  of  Jesus  that  he  was  the 
only  one  who  sympathized  with  a  world 
gone  astray.    In  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  143 

we  read  that  Jesus  is  our  great  High  Priest, 
being  able  to  sympathize  with  the  ignorant 
and  the  erring.  It  is  thi^  compassionate 
Christ  whom  Luke  sets  before  us  in  his 
pages.  He  is  not  seeking  the  self-satisfied, 
but  the  self-despairing.  It  was  the  sickest 
who  had  greatest  need.  It  was  those  whom 
all  others  had  deserted  who  most  needed  a 
friend.  Jesus  in  this  Gospel  is  the  Good 
Shepherd  seeking  for  the  outcast  in  the 
farthest  mountains  of  social  ostracism  or 
willful  sin.  Jesus  was  a  Jew.  He  had  had  a 
Jewish  training.  He  lived  always  in  a  Jew- 
ish environment.  He  never  had  the  ad- 
vantage of  foreign  travel  and  he  never  came 
under  the  broadening  influence  of  residence 
among  the  many  races  of  men.  Yet  he 
never  displays  any  Jewish  narrowness  or 
prejudice.  He  is  interested  in  all  men  alike. 
No  man,  of  whatever  nationality  or  of  what- 
ever previous  spiritual  condition,  is  beyond 
his  sympathy  or  the  ready  proffer  of  his  help. 
1.  This  is  the  Gospel  in  which  we  read  of 
the  prodigal  son  who  wastes  all  his  living 
on  harlots  and  yet  is  not  beyond  reclama- 


144.  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

tion,  and  who  comes  back  at  last  to  the 
father's  home  and  to  the  unhesitating  and 
undiminished  love  of  the  father's  heart. ^ 

2.  This  is  the  Gospel  of  the  publican 
Zacchseus,  generally  regarded  as  a  sinner 
with  whom  no  respectable  people  ought  to 
have  any  social  dealings,  but  with  whom 
Jesus  went  to  lodge,  and  whom  Jesus 
acknowledged  as  a  son  of  Abraham. ^ 

3.  This  is  the  Gospel  of  the  sinful  woman 
with  whom  Simon  the  Pharisee  would  have 
been  ashamed  to  show  any  personal  ac- 
quaintance in  public,  but  whom  Jesus 
recognized  and  whose  service  he  gladly  ac- 
cepted and  whose  sins  he  freely  forgave.^ 

4.  This  is  the  Gospel  in  which  the  cruci- 
fied criminal,  a  coarse  bandit  who  was 
given  up  by  the  state  as  a  hopeless  case, 
and  was  paying  the  penalty  of  his  many 
crimes,  walked  straight  into  paradise  with 
the  sinless  Lord.^ 

In  this  Gospel  the  harlot  and  the  crim- 
inal, the  prodigal  and  the  social  pariah,  of 
whatever  class  or  condition,  are  freely  of- 

1 15.  11-32,  a  19.  2-10.  »  7.  36-50.  *  23.  40-43. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  145 

fered  the  society  and  the  service  of  the 
purest  and  the  best.  Do  the  preachers  of 
to-day  associate  with  these  classes  ?  Are 
they  on  terms  of  famihar  acquaintance  with 
them  ?  Are  they  continually  finding  con- 
verts among  them  ?  Are  they  continually 
proving  that  they  who  are  forgiven  most 
love  most,  and  that  from  these  classes  the 
most  devoted  saints  may  come  ?  If  they 
are  not,  their  gospel  must  be  somewhat 
different  from  the  gospel  of  Luke  and  his 
Lord;  or,  if  they  have  the  same  gospel, 
their  ministration  of  it  must  be  somewhat 
different. 

Does  not  this  Gospel  according  to  Luke 
suggest  that  every  Christian  preacher  to- 
day ought  to  know  every  saloon  keeper  in 
his  neighborhood  and  every  inmate  of 
every  house  of  ill  fame,  and  that  a  part  of 
his  ministry  ought  to  be  given  to  these,  and 
that  some  of  the  chief  triumphs  of  his 
ministry  ought  to  be  found  among  these  ? 
Surely,  conditions  have  not  so  changed  that 
we  need  to  despair  of  any  man  or  of  any 
woman  now,  or   that  we  ought  to   recog- 


146  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

nize  any  social  outcasts  now,  to  whom  It 
is  not  our  duty  to  carry  the  good  news  of 
salvation. 

The  Gospel  according  to  Luke  is  the 
gospel  of  the  children,  the  gospel  of  woman- 
hood, the  gospel  of  the  poor,  and  the  gospel 
of  the  outcast  and  forsaken.  Of  course, 
the  other  synoptics  have  some  suggestions 
of  these  things,  but  they  are  so  numerous 
in  the  third  Gospel  and  they  are  so  fre- 
quently found  in  the  portions  peculiar  to  it 
that  they  become  characteristic  of  the  nar- 
rative written  by  Luke.  They  might  be 
accounted  for  altogether  by  his  knowledge 
of  and  his  sympathy  with  the  character  of 
Jesus,  who  was  the  friend  of  the  little  ones 
and  the  women  and  the  poor  and  the  pub- 
licans and  sinners  in  all  his  ministry.  They 
might  be  accounted  for  altogether  by 
Luke's  personal  character  and  by  his  over- 
flowing sympathy  for  all  the  helpless  and 
oppressed.  We  have  endeavored  to  show 
that  in  addition  to  these  things  his  pro- 
fession as  a  physician  must  have  influenced 
him  largely  in  his  choice  of  materials  for 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  147 

his  gospel  history.  The  sign-manual  of 
the  physician  is  written  large  over  the 
pages  of  his  narrative  and  is  apparent  also 
in  his  peculiar  and  characteristic  interest  in 
certain  classes — the  women  and  children, 
the  outcast  and  the  poor.  We  might  con- 
tinue our  classification  of  the  general  char- 
acteristics of  the  Gospel  according  to  Luke 
under  this  general  head,  but  we  prefer  to 
turn  now  from  Luke  the  physician  to  Luke 
the  companion  of  Paul. 

XL  The  Pauline  Gospel 

Much  more  nearly  than  the  other  two 
synoptics,  the  Gospel  according  to  Luke  is 
the  Gospel  according  to  Paul.  It  is  but 
natural  that  the  Gentile  Gospel  should 
reflect  most  largely  the  theology  of  the 
apostle  to  the  Gentiles.  Luke's  close  per- 
sonal association  with  the  apostle  Paul 
must  have  influenced  him  greatly  in  his 
conceptions  of  the  scope,  the  content,  and 
the  aim  of  the  gospel  message  and  truth. 
Paul  was  more  nearly  a  systematic  theo- 
logian than  any  other  of  the  New  Testa- 


148  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

ment  writers.  Luke  has  managed  to  get 
much  more  doctrine  into  his  Gospel  nar- 
rative than  the  other  synoptics;  and  the 
doctrine  of  Luke  is  substantially  the  doc- 
trine of  Paul. 

Three  times  in  his  epistles  Paul  speaks  of 
*'my  gospel."^  Origen,  Eusebius,^  and  Je- 
rome^ thought  that  Paul  meant  by  this 
phrase  the  Gospel  according  to  Luke.  That 
was  his  gospel  because  it  represented  his 
point  of  view  throughout.  Irenseus*  had 
written  still  earlier,  "Luke,  the  companion 
of  Paul,  committed  to  writing  the  gospel 
preached  by  the  latter."  There  is  so  much 
in  common  between  the  Gospel  written  by 
Luke  and  the  gospel  preached  by  Paul 
that  we  can  readily  believe  that  Paul's 
influence  is  manifest  in  Luke's  writing,  but 
we  do  not  believe  that  Paul  ever  called  the 
third  Gospel  his  own  in  the  sense  that  he 
claimed  any  personal  responsibility  for  its 
composition.  When  he  spoke  of  "my  gos- 
pel" he  meant  only  the  revelation  made  to 

1  Rom.  2.  16;  Rom.  16.  25;  2  Tim.  2.  8.  =  Ecclesiastical  History,  iii,  4.  8. 
3  De  Viris  Illustribus,  vii.  ^Adveraus  Haeresea,  iii,  1.  1. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  149 

himself  and  proclaimed  in  his  preaching. 
We  have  no  reason  to  believe  that  the 
word  "gospel"  was  used  as  a  proper  name 
in  any  of  the  New  Testament  writings  or 
was  applied  at  any  time  to  any  of  the  books 
we  now  call  by  such  title. 

The  truth  behind  this  tradition  of  Paul's 
personal  appropriation  of  the  third  Gospel 
is,  as  Plummer  says,  the  fact  that  "Paul 
was  the  illuminator  of  Luke  (Tert.  iv,  2): 
he  enlightened  him  as  to  the  essential 
character  of  the  gospel.  Luke,  as  his  fellow 
worker,  would  teach  what  the  apostle 
taught,  and  would  learn  to  give  promi- 
nence to  those  elements  in  the  gospel  narra- 
tive of  which  he  made  most  frequent  use." 
The  old  Latin  proverb  said,  Noscitur  a 
sociis,  "A  man  is  known  by  the  company 
he  keeps."  No  one  could  be  a  close  com- 
panion with  the  apostle  Paul  without 
being  influenced  by  him  in  both  life  and 
thought.  We  have  already  seen  that  Luke 
was  not  only  a  companion,  but  a  beloved 
physician  and  a  congenial  friend.  Cole- 
ridge used  to  say  that  no  one  was  fit  to  be 


150  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

a  commentator  upon  the  Epistles  of  Paul 
except  Martin  Luther,  and  Luther  failed 
because  he  was  not  such  a  gentleman  as 
Paul.  Now,  Luke  was  a  gentleman.  He 
had  something  of  the  innate  courtesy  that 
characterized  the  great  apostle,  and  in  this 
Gospel  we  find  the  general  impress  made 
by  the  character  and  the  creed  of  the 
apostle  upon  such  a  man. 

Having  thus  determined  the  nature  of 
Luke's  indebtedness  to  Paul,  we  will  now 
look  for  the  more  specific  proofs  of  such 
relationship  in  the  writings  of  these  two 
men. 

1.  We  notice  some  remarkable  parallel- 
isms of  expression  at  several  points.  (1)  In 
the  account  of  the  Lord's  Supper  neither 
Matthew  nor  Mark  tells  us  that  the  Lord 
said,  "Do  this  in  remembrance  of  me." 
Luke,  in  22.  19,  and  Paul,  in  1  Cor.  11.  24, 
are  the  only  ones  to  record  it.  Matthew 
and  Mark  say  that  the  Lord  said,  "This 
is  my  blood  of  the  covenant,"  while 
Paul  and  Luke  record  the  words  as, 
"This    cup    is    the    new  covenant  in  my 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  151 

blood. "^  Matthew  and  Mark  connect  the 
Eucharist,  or  thanksgiving,  with  the  cup; 
Paul  and  Luke  connect  it  with  the  bread. 
These  striking  differences  from  the  other 
accounts  and  close  similarities  between  Paul 
and  Luke  would  be  sufficient  in  themselves 
to  suggest  that  these  two  men  had  been 
associated  many  a  time  in  the  administra- 
tion of  this  sacrament,  and  had  so  come  to 
adopt  the  same  formulation  in  the  account 
of  it. 

(2)  In  1  Cor.  15.  5  Paul  tells  us  that  the 
risen  Lord  appeared  to  Cephas.  The  only 
other  mention  of  this  resurrection  appear- 
ance in  the  New  Testament  is  to  be  found 
in  Luke  24.  34:  "The  Lord  is  risen  indeed, 
and  hath  appeared  to  Simon."  Paul  and 
Luke  seem  to  have  regarded  this  as  one  of 
the  important  appearances,  or  at  least 
worthy  of  mention  in  any  account  of  them. 
All  our  other  authorities  are  utterly  silent 
concerning  it. 

(3)  Some  have  thought  that  a  threefold 
classification  of  ideas  is  characteristic  of 


iLuke  22.  20;  1  Cor.  11.  25. 


152  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

both  Paul  and  Luke.  We  recall  such  pas- 
sages in  the  Epistles  of  Paul,  as  1  Cor.  13. 
13,  "Now  abideth  faith,  hope,  love,  these 
three,"  and  that  other  enumeration  of  the 
essential  elements  in  the  unity  of  the 
Spirit  set  forth  in  Eph.  4.  4-6,  falling  into 
three  groups  of  three:  one  body,  one  Spirit, 
one  hope;  one  Lord,  one  faith,  one  bap- 
tism; one  God  and  Father  of  all,  tran- 
scendent, omnipresent,  immanent,  over  all, 
through  all,  in  all.  When  we  turn  to  Luke 
we  jBnd  him  recording  the  three  parables 
of  the  lost  sheep,  the  lost  coin,  and  the 
lost  son  together,  while  Matthew  has  the 
parable  of  the  lost  sheep  alone.  ^  Luke 
tells  us  of  three  would-be  disciples  who  are 
turned  away  by  our  Lord,  and  in  the 
parallel  passage  in  Matthew^  we  find 
mention  of  only  two.  Compare  also  the 
loaf,  fish,  and  egg  of  Luke  11.  11,  12  with 
the  bread  and  fish  of  Matt.  7.  9,  10. 

(4)  There  are  many  phrases  common  to 
Paul  and  Luke  and  not  to  be  met  anywhere 
else  in  the  New  Testament.     Long  lists  of 

1 18.  12.  2  8.  19-22. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  153 

these  have  been  prepared  by  many  authori- 
ties. We  suggest  a  few  samples  only 
among  them.  Compare  Luke  4.  22  with 
Col.  4.  6,  and  Luke  8.  15  with  Col.  1.  10,  11, 
and  Luke  6.  39  with  Rom.  2.  19,  and  Luke 
10.  8  with  1  Cor.  10.  27,  and  Luke  21.  36 
with  Eph.  6.  18. 

2.  To  these  parallelisms  in  expression  we 
add,  in  the  second  place,  a  remarkable 
similarity  in  the  use  of  single  terms.  For 
example : 

(1)  The  double  title  "Lord  Jesus"  is  found 
nearly  a  hundred  times  in  the  Epistles  of 
Paul.  It  is  found  only  once  in  the  synoptic 
Gospels — in  Luke  24.  3. 

(2)  The  name  "Lord"  is  applied  to  Jesus 
again  and  again  by  Paul.  It  is  never  so 
used  in  the  Gospel  according  to  Mark  ex- 
cept by  the  heathen  Syrophoenician  woman 
in  7.  28.  The  title  occurs  fourteen  times 
in  Luke,  and  so  makes  another  con- 
necting link  between  his  usage  and  that  of 
Paul. 

(3)  The  proper  name  "Satan"  is  used  by 
Paul  ten  times,  by  Luke  seven  times,  by 


164  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Mark  six  times,  by  Matthew  four  times, 
and  by  John  only  once. 

(4)  The  word  "Saviour"  is  not  found  in 
Matthew  or  Mark.  It  occurs  twice  in 
Luke,  once  in  John,  and  a  multitude  of 
times  in  Paul. 

(5)  The  word  "salvation"  is  not  found  in 
Matthew  or  Mark.  It  occurs  four  times 
in  Luke,  once  in  John,  on  page  after  page 
in  the  writings  of  Paul. 

(6)  The  word  "grace"  is  characteristic  of 
Paul's  most  frequent  and  emphatic  usage. 
It  is  never  found  in  Matthew  and  Mark.  It 
occurs  eight  times  in  Luke  and  three  times 
in  John.  It  is  found  one  hundred  and 
forty-six  times  in  the  New  Testament,  but 
only  twenty-one  times  outside  the  writings 
of  Luke  and  Paul. 

(7)  "Faith"  is  another  keyword  in  Paul's 
theology.  It  is  found  in  Luke  eleven  times, 
in  Matthew  eight,  in  Mark  five,  and  in 
John  not  at  all.  In  the  book  of  Acts  the 
word  occurs  sixteen  times.  It  is  found  in 
the  New  Testament  two  hundred  and 
forty-three    times,     but     only     fifty-three 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  155 

times    outside  the  writings  of   Luke   and 
Paul. 

(8)  Repentance  is  joined  with  faith  in 
the  usage  of  Paul  as  one  of  the  essentials 
to  salvation.  The  word  "repentance," 
HErdvoia,  is  found  in  Luke  five  times,  in 
Matthew  two,  in  Mark  only  once,  and  in 
John  not  at  all.  It  occurs  in  the  book  of 
Acts  six  times. 

(9)  Paul  joins  mercy  with  grace  and 
peace  in  some  of  his  salutations.  The 
word  "mercy,"  lAfo?,  is  found  in  Luke 
six  times,  in  Matthew  three,  and  in  Mark 
and  John  and  the  book  of  Acts  not  at  all. 
To  Luke  all  the  perfection  of  God  would 
seem  to  be  summed  up  in  his  quality  of 
mercy.  In  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  as 
reported  by  Matthew,  the  climax  of  com- 
mand is  found  in  the  words,  "Be  ye  there- 
fore perfect,  even  as  your  Father  in 
heaven  is  perfect,"^  but  Luke  chronicles  the 
corresponding  command  in  his  Sermon  on 
the  Plain  in  these  words,  "Be  ye  therefore 
merciful,  as  your  Father  is  also  merciful."^ 

>Matt.  5.  48.  2  6.  36. 


166  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

He  who  attains  this  height  will  find  nothing 
beyond  him. 

We  may  say,  in  general,  that  Luke's 
vocabulary  is  much  more  Pauline  than  that 
of  the  other  gospel  writers.  Luke  has  one 
hundred  and  one  words  in  common  with 
Paul  which  are  not  to  be  found  in  any 
other  writers  of  the  New  Testament  books. 
Matthew  has  only  thirty-two  and  Mark 
twenty-two  and  John  twenty-one. 

3.  However,  it  is  when  we  come  to  the 
doctrinal  features  they  have  in  common 
that  the  relationship  between  the  writings 
of  Luke  and  Paul  becomes  most  apparent. 
(1)  The  third  Gospel  furnishes  the  histori- 
cal background  for  just  such  teaching  and 
preaching  as  that  of  the  great  apostle  of 
the  Gentiles,  Paul.  In  its  narrative  Israel 
is  rejected  and  the  way  is  opened  for  the 
reception  of  the  Gentiles  into  the  kingdom 
of  God  just  as  clearly  as  in  the  ninth,  tenth, 
and  eleventh  chapters  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Romans,  a.  In  the  first  sermon  in  the 
ministry  of  Jesus  he  made  it  apparent  to 
his  fellow  townsmen  in  Nazareth  that  the 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  157 

heathen  might  enjoy  the  blessings  they 
were  ready  to  despise.^  h.  In  the  middle 
of  his  ministry  Jesus  answers  the  question, 
"Are  there  few  that  be  saved?"  by  de- 
claring, *'They  shall  come  from  the  east 
and  west,  and  from  the  north  and  south, 
and  shall  sit  down  in  the  kingdom  of  God; 
but  ye  yourselves  shall  be  cast  forth  with- 
out."^ c.  At  the  close  of  his  ministry  Jesus 
told  his  disciples  that  it  was  written  that 
repentance  and  remission  of  sins  should  be 
preached  in  his  name  unto  all  the  nations.^ 
From  the  beginning  to  the  end  the  Gentiles 
are  included  within  the  scope  of  the  gospel 
salvation. 

(2)  In  thorough  consistency  with  this 
fundamental  position  we  find  a  spirit  of 
wide-reaching  and  all-inclusive  tolerance 
characterizing  this  Gospel  even  as  it  did 
the  preaching  of  Paul.  See  how  this  is 
apparent  in  the  attitude  of  Jesus  as  pic- 
tured here  toward  the  Samaritans.  The 
Jews  had  no  dealings  with  the  Samaritans. 
They   considered    them   even   worse   than 

1 4.  24-27.  2 13.  23-29.  ^  24.  47. 


158  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Gentile  dogs.  a.  When  the  Samaritan  vil- 
lagers showed  themselves  inhospitable 
James  and  John  were  ready  to  call  down 
fire  from  heaven  upon  them,  in  the  spirit 
of  Elijah.  But  Jesus  declared  that  the 
intolerant  spirit  of  Elijah  was  not  the 
spirit  of  the  gospel  he  had  come  to  preach. 
That  gospel  would  include  and  in  due  time 
would  win  the  Samaritans  as  well  as  the 
Jews.^  h.  Again,  when  ten  lepers  were 
healed  and  only  one  returned  to  give 
thanks  unto  God  both  Jesus  and  the  evan- 
gelist call  attention  to  the  fact  that  the 
one  grateful  man  was  a  Samaritan 
stranger.^  c.  Again,  in  the  Master's  par- 
able of  the  one  who  proved  himself  neigh- 
bor to  the  man  who  fell  among  thieves  he 
chose  as  the  hero  of  that  tale  no  Jewish 
priest  or  Levite,  but  a  good  Samaritan.^  It 
is  in  the  third  Gospel  alone  that  we  find 
these  three  references  to  the  Samaritans, 
and  they  all  breathe  the  same  spirit  of  toler- 
ance and  friendliness  that  was  to  charac- 
terize a  gospel  preached  to  and  for  all  men. 

1  9.  52-55.  2  17.  11-19.  »  10.  30-37. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  159 

(3)  The  emphatic  and  persistent  presen- 
tation of  the  personahty  of  the  Holy  Spirit 
is  characteristic  of  both  Luke  and  Paul. 
Where  Matthew  reads,  "If  ye  then,  being 
evil,  know  how  to  give  good  gifts  unto 
your  children,  how  much  more  shall  your 
Father  who  is  in  heaven  give  good  things 
to  them  that  ask  him?"^  Luke  sums  up  all 
good  things  in  that  one  greatest  gift  of  the 
Father  to  men  and  says,  "How  much  more 
shall  your  heavenly  Father  give  the  Holy 
Spirit  to  them  that  ask  him  ?"^  In  the 
third  Gospel  we  find  eighteen  references  to 
the  Holy  Spirit,  thirteen  of  them  in  four 
chapters;  and  in  the  whole  of  Matthew 
there  are  only  twelve,  and  in  Mark  only 
six.  Luke  therefore  has  as  many  as  Mat- 
thew and  Mark  combined. 

If  we  were  to  name  the  three  features  in 
which  the  doctrinal  teaching  of  Luke  and 
of  Paul  are  most  alike,  we  would  mention: 
1.  The  universal  scope  of  the  gospel,  because 
of  the  marvelous  grace  and  all-inclusive  love 
shown  by  God  to  men.  2.  The  importance  of 

iMatt.  7.  11.  2  Luke  11.  13. 


160  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

the  work  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  3.  The  em- 
phasis laid  upon  the  real  humanity  of  Jesus. 
We  turn  next  to  consider  this  characteristic 
of  the  Gospel  according  to  Luke. 

It  is  the  Gospel  of  the  real  humanity  of 
Jesus.  It  is  the  Gospel  of  Jesus  as  our 
Brother-Man.  It  is  the  Gospel  of  the 
Kinsman-Redeemer  of  the  race.  Here  for 
the  first  time  in  the  New  Testament  we 
meet  the  word  "redemption" — "He  hath 
visited  and  wrought  redemption  for  his 
people,"  Zacharias  sings. ^  We  are  told 
that  Anna  spoke  of  Jesus  to  all  them  that 
looked  for  redemption  in  Jerusalem.^  The 
two  disheartened  disciples  on  their  way  to 
Emmaus  said,  "We  trusted  that  it  had 
been  he  which  should  have  redeemed  Is- 
rael."^ Redemption  by  a  genuine  incarna- 
tion— that  is  the  great  theme  of  this  Gospel. 

XII.  The  Gospel  of  Jesus,  Our 
Brother-Man 
1.  In  early  life.     It  begins  by  showing 
that  the  birth  and  infancy  and  childhood 

11.68.  2  2.38.  '24.21. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  161 

of  Jesus  were  those  of  any  normal  human 
Hfe.  (1)  Luke  alone  tells  us  about  the 
poverty  of  the  surroundings  into  which  the 
baby  boy  came,  born  of  a  woman,  bone  of 
our  bone,  and  flesh  of  our  flesh,  wrapped  in 
the  swaddling  clothes  and  laid  in  the  stable 
straw. ^ 

(2)  Luke  tells  us  that  he  was  circum- 
cised like  every  other  Jewish  boy.^  It 
was  the  first  shedding  of  redeeming  blood. 
It  was  his  first  external  identification  with 
the  religious  life  of  his  race. 

(3)  Luke  also  tells  us  about  his  presen- 
tation in  the  temple.^  Born  under  the  law, 
it  became  him  to  fulfill  all  righteousness. 

(4)  Luke  records  the  fact  that  the  child 
Jesus  grew  as  every  other  child  grew,  in- 
creasing in  size  and  increasing  in  strength, 
and  correspondingly  increasing  in  wisdom 
as  the  days  and  the  years  went  by.^  The 
boy  Jesus  is  neither  omniscient  nor  om- 
nipotent, but  just  a  normal,  natural, 
healthy,  and  growing  boy,  according  to 
this  passage  in  Luke. 

1 2.  4-7.  a  2.  21.  »  2.  22.  *  2.  40. 


162  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

(5)  Luke  tells  us  how  Jesus  went  up  to 
Jerusalem  to  celebrate  his  first  passover  as 
a  son  of  the  Law,  and  how  he  sat  in  the 
temple  in  the  midst  of  the  teachers,  both 
hearing  them,  and  asking  them  questions.^ 

(6)  Luke  adds  that  through  all  his  mi- 
nority in  the  home  at  Nazareth  Jesus  was 
subject  to  his  parents,  as  any  lad  would  be 
expected  to  be.^ 

(7)  Then,  lest  anyone  should  think  that 
the  youth  of  Jesus  was  not  like  his  child- 
hood or  like  the  youth  of  any  other  lad  in 
its  gradual  development  of  all  its  powers, 
Luke  tells  us  again  that  Jesus  advanced  in 
wisdom  and  stature,  and  in  favor  with 
God  and  men.^  It  is  Luke  alone  who  has 
given  us  this  information  concerning  the 
babe  and  the  boy  and  the  youth,  and  he 
has  shown  us  that  Jesus  was  just  like  us 
in  his  human  birth  and  growth,  glorifying 
babyhood  and  obedient  childhood  by  en- 
tering fully  into  their  estate. 

2.  At  the  close  of  life.  When  we  turn  to 
the   close   of   the   narrative   we   find   that 

» 2,  42-46.  2  2.51  3  2.52. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  163 

Luke  is  very  careful  to  show  us  that  Jesus 
is  very  human  at  every  point.     (1)  Luke 
tells  us  that  when  Jesus  wept  over  Jeru- 
salem he  wept  audibly,  sobbing  aloud  in 
his  profound  grief,  genuinely  human  and 
pitiful.^    He  wept  at  the  grave  of  Lazarus, 
but  there  he  wept  silently.     John  has  re- 
corded that  weeping,^  but  neither  John  nor 
Luke   nor   any   other   evangelist   has   ever 
recorded  the  fact  that  Jesus  laughed.     He 
was   a   "man   of   sorrows,   and   acquainted 
with  grief";  but  he  must  have  had  some 
moments  of  relaxation.     We  feel  sure  that 
he  must  have  smiled  many  and  many  a 
time,   and  it  would   be   strange  indeed   if 
there    were    not    occasions    when    he    was 
provoked    into    hearty    laughter.      He   en- 
tered  so   thoroughly   into   sympathy   with 
the  joys  as  well  as  the  sorrows  of  those 
who  were  his  friends  that  he  must  have 
laughed  with  them  sometimes.     The  pic- 
ture of  normal  boyhood  which  Luke  pre- 
sents in  this  Gospel  would  be  incomplete  if 
we  were  not  allowed  to  imagine  in  it  cer- 

>  19.  41-44.  «Johnll.35. 


164  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

tain  moments  of  unrestrained  merriment  in 
the  enjoyment  of  innocent  fun.  We  think 
that  he  would  have  been  more  likely  to 
pipe  and  dance  and  laugh  with  the  other 
children  of  Nazareth  in  their  games  in 
the  market  place  than  to  join  in  any 
funeral  performances  or  mock  mourning. 
His  youth  was  a  happy  one,  but  he  be- 
came a  Man  of  sorrows,  and  as  he  treads 
the  thorny  path  to  the  cross  with  suffering 
and  tears  Luke  shows  us  that  he  was  very 
man  at  every  step. 

(2)  Luke  records  that  an  angel  appeared 
to  him  in  Gethsemane,  strengthening  him.^ 
Truly  man,  he  needed  heavenly  aid. 

(3)  Luke  alone  tells  us  of  the  extremity 
of  human  weakness  and  physical  agony 
through  which  Jesus  passed  in  Geth- 
semane, in  which  "his  sweat  became  as  it 
were  great  drops  of  blood  falling  down 
upon  the  ground."^ 

(4)  Luke  alone  tells  us  that  in  that 
Gethsemane  arrest  Jesus  called  himself 
again   by   his  favorite  title   by   means   of 

»  22.  43.  2  22.  44. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  165 

which  he  so  continually  identified  himself 
with  the  human  race  and  proclaimed  his 
brotherhood  with  all  other  men,  for  he 
said,  "Judas,  betrayest  thou  tlie  Son  of 
man  with  a  kiss  ?"^ 

(5)  Luke  has  the  record  that  in  utter 
human  dependence  upon  the  Father  in  the 
hour  and  article  of  death  he  said,  "Father, 
into  thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit."^ 

(6)  Luke  alone  tells  us  that  the  cen- 
turion who  stood  by  and  saw  him  suffer 
and  die  was  so  impressed  that  "he  glorified 
God,  saying.  Certainly  this  was  a  righteous 
man.^'^ 

(7)  Luke  tells  us  that  after  his  resurrec- 
tion, in  the  appearance  to  the  assembled 
disciples  on  that  first  Easter  eve,  Jesus 
sought  to  convince  them  that  his  incarnate 
humanity  had  survived  death  and  the 
grave,  and  that  his  human  identity  was 
unimpaired.  He  said  to  them,  "See  my 
hands  and  my  feet,  that  it  is  I  myself: 
handle  me,  and  see;  for  a  spirit  hath  not 
flesh  and  bones,  as  ye  behold  me  having." 

>  22.  48.  a  23.  46.  «  23.  47. 


166  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

Then  he  took  a  piece  of  broiled  fish  "and 
ate  before  them."^  As  at  the  beginning  of 
his  hfe,  so  at  the  close  of  his  life,  Luke 
insists  upon  the  Lord's  real  humanity. 
There  is  no  human  weakness  or  limitation 
in  which  Jesus  does  not  share.  He  is  one 
with  us  in  everything  but  sin;  and  he  was 
one  with  us  after  the  resurrection  and  in 
the  ascension  as  well. 

In  his  birth  and  early  life  Luke  has 
shown  us  that  the  Lord  was  really  and 
truly  man.  Through  the  closing  days  and 
in  his  death  Luke  has  made  it  equally 
clear  that  Jesus  was  genuinely  human  to 
the  last.  How  about  the  years  of  his  ac- 
tive ministry?  To  us  there  is  no  better 
proof  of  the  real  and  genuine  humanity  of 
Jesus  than  his  prayers  afford  us;  and  no 
one  of  the  evangelists  has  emphasized  the 
Lord's  need  and  practice  of  prayer  as  Luke 
has.  Through  all  his  ministry  he  shows  us 
the  man  Jesus  continually  exercising  the 
grace  of  true  spiritual  dependence.  Luke 
repeatedly  tells  us  that  Jesus  was  praying 

»  24.  39-43. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  167 

when   the    other   evangeHsts    say    nothing 
about  it. 

3.  In  the  life  of  prayer.  (1)  We  read  in 
the  other  Gospels  about  the  baptism  of 
Jesus  in  the  Jordan,  but  Luke  alone  tells 
us  that  it  was  as  Jesus  was  being  baptized 
and  praying  that  the  heaven  was  opened 
for  the  descent  of  the  Holy  Spirit  and  the 
witness  of  the  heavenly  Voice.^ 

(2)  We  read  in  some  of  the  other  Gospels 
about  the  cleansing  of  the  leper  and  the 
immediately  succeeding  collision  with  the 
religious  authorities.  Luke  only  tells  us 
that  between  these  two  events  Jesus 
withdrew  himself  into  the  deserts  arid 
prayed.^ 

(3)  We  read  in  the  other  Gospels  of  the 
choice  of  the  twelve.  Luke  tells  us  that 
that  choice  was  made  in  the  early  morning, 
after  Jesus  had  continued  in  prayer  all 
night  long  upon  the  mountain  alone.^ 

(4)  Luke  tells  us  that  it  was  after  Jesus 
had  been  praying  apart  that  Peter  made 
the  great  confession,  and  Jesus  answered  it 

»3.  21.  S5.  16.  3C.  12,  13. 


168  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

with  his  first  prediction  of  his  own  future 
suffering  and  certain  murder.^ 

(5)  Others  tell  us  about  the  transfigura- 
tion experience,  but  Luke  alone  informs  us 
that  Jesus  had  gone  up  into  that  mountain 
to  pray,  and  that  as  he  was  'praying  the 
fashion  of  his  countenance  was  altered, 
and  he  was  transfigured  before  the  disciples' 
eyes.^ 

(6)  Matthew  records  the  prayer  pre- 
scribed for  the  disciples,  "Our  Father  who 
art  in  heaven,  hallowed  be  thy  name,"  as 
a  part  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  Luke 
alone  tells  us  that  that  Prayer  was  first 
given  when  Jesus  had  been  praying  in  a 
certain  place,  and  when  he  ceased  one  of 
his  disciples  had  asked  him.  Lord,  wilt 
thou  teach  us  to  pray  ?^ 

(7)  Luke  tells  us  that  Jesus  said  to 
Peter,  "Simon,  Simon,  behold,  Satan  asked 
to  have  you,  that  he  might  sift  you  as 
wheat:  but  I  made  supplication  for  thee, 
that  thy  faith  fail  not."^ 

(8)  Luke  records  that  Jesus  prayed  on 

»9.  18-22.  29.  28,  29.  ^  11.  1-4.  4  22.  31,  32. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  169 

the  cross,  "Father,  forgive  them;  for  they 
know  not  what  they  do."^ 

(9)  Luke  adds  that  Jesus  made  his  last 
breath  a  breath  of  prayer.  He  cried  wuth 
a  loud  voice,  "Father,  into  thy  hands  I 
commend  my  spirit:  and  having  said  this, 
he  gave  up  the  ghost. "^ 

Jesus  needed  to  pray  just  as  much  as  we 
need  to  pray.  He  prayed  to  God  for 
strength  because  he  needed  strength.  He 
prayed  to  God  for  guidance  because  he 
needed  guidance.  He  prayed  to  God  for 
knowledge  because  he  needed  enlighten- 
ment. He  prayed  for  miracle-working 
power,  and  it  was  granted  him  in  answer 
to  his  holy  prayer.  He  asked  for  the  Holy 
Spirit,  and  by  his  aid  he  lived  a  holy  life. 
He  is  our  perfect  Pattern  in  prayer.  He  is 
our  Prince  of  faith.  Luke  has  emphasized 
this  fact  as  no  other  New  Testament  writer 
has.  We  are  not  surprised,  therefore,  that 
he  not  only  has  given  us  the  example 
of  Jesus  in  the  practice  of  the  prayer  life, 
but  he    also   has    preserved    for    us   some 

1  23.  34.  2  23.  46. 


170  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

additional  instructions  given  by  Jesus  con- 
cerning prayer. 

(1)  Luke  alone  tells  us  that  Jesus  spoke 
a  parable  to  the  end  that  men  ought  always 
to  pray  and  not  to  faint. ^ 

(2)  He  tells  us  that  Jesus  in  that  parable 
declared  that  the  elect  of  God  cry  to  him 
day  and  night.^ 

(3)  Luke  alone  gives  us  those  three 
prayer  parables  of  Jesus,  the  importunate 
friend,^  the  importunate  widow/  and  the 
pompously  praying  Pharisee  and  the 
piously  praying  publican.^  They  all  teach 
by  contrast.  You  do  not  need  to  pray  like 
the  importunate  friend,  for  you  pray  to  a 
Father  in  heaven  who  is  not  asleep  in  bed 
and  who  is  more  ready  to  give  than  you 
are  to  ask.  You  do  not  need  to  behave  like 
that  importunate  widow,  for  you  do  not 
pray  to  an  unjust  judge,  but  to  a  loving 
Father  who  will  avenge  you  speedily.  You 
must  not  pray  like  that  self-announcing 
Pharisee,  but  like  the  self-denouncing  and 
self-renouncing  publican. 

>  18.  1.  2  18.  7.  3 11.  5-9.  4  18.  1-8.  s  i8.  9-14. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  171 

(4)  Matthew  25.  13  and  Mark  13.  33  tell 
us  that  the  Lord  exhorted  the  disciples  to 
"watch"  in  view  of  the  coming  perils  and 
trials  of  the  church;  but  Luke  adds  "at  every 
season,  making  supplication^  that  ye  may 
prevail."^ 

(5)  Luke  alone  tells  us  that  when  they  had 
come  to  the  garden  of  Gethsemane  Jesus 
exhorted  the  disciple  band,  ''Pray  that  ye  en- 
ter not  into  temptation."^  It  was  only  after 
having  given  this  final  warning  and  com- 
mand that  he  went  on  into  his  own  spiritual 
wrestling  and  final  victory  through  prayer. 

If  the  disciples  of  Jesus  had  learned  to 
pray  as  their  Master  prayed,  their  victory 
would  have  been  as  sure  and  as  continuous 
as  his  own.  He  was  their  Master  in  the 
practice  and  the  precept  of  prayer,  as  in 
everything  else.  Luke  recognizes  him  as 
such.  That  title  "Master,"  emardTi](;,  is 
peculiar  to  Luke  in  the  New  Testament. 
He  alone  records  the  fact  that  the  disciples 
gave  this  name  to  Jesus;  and  in  the  third 
Gospel  we  find  it  seven  times. ^ 

1  21.  30.  2  22.  40.  3  5.  5.  §.  24;  S.  45;  9.  33;  9.  49;  17.  13. 


172  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

4.  In  social  life.  It  is  characteristic  of 
the  third  Gospel  that  it  pictures  Jesus  as 
entering  into  all  the  social  relations  of  life. 
Much  more  frequently  than  the  other  evan- 
gelists Luke  tells  us  how  Jesus  was  enter- 
tained in  private  homes,  was  invited  to 
dinners,  and  sat  at  meat  with  various  hosts 
and  sometimes  with  many  guests;  and 
much  of  the  teaching  which  Matthew 
represents  Jesus  as  giving  in  public  dis- 
courses we  find  Luke  recording  in  connec- 
tion with  these  social  events. 

(1)  Luke  tells  us  that  a  certain  Simon,  a 
Pharisee,  invited  Jesus  to  eat  with  him,  but 
neglected  to  show  him  the  usual  courtesies 
offered  to  guests,  and  when  Jesus  was 
anointed  by  the  sinful  woman  Simon  was 
told  the  parable  of  the  two  debtors,  and 
was  thus  gently  rebuked.^ 

(2)  Luke  tells  us  of  the  reception  in 
the  house  of  Martha  and  Mary,  and  of 
Martha's  ministration  to  the  bodily  needs 
of  the  company  while  Mary  ministered  to 
the  Master's  wearied  soul.^ 

»  7.  36-50.  2  10.  38-42. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  173 

(3)  Luke  tells  us  how  another  Pharisee 
asked  Jesus  to  dine  with  him,  and  while 
they  were  sitting  at  the  table  Jesus  uttered 
that  scathing  rebuke  of  Pharisaical  hy- 
pocrisy and  sin.^  Evidently  Jesus  did  not 
consider  the  acceptance  of  any  man's  hos- 
pitality a  sufficient  reason  for  blinking  any 
man's  sin. 

(4)  Luke  alone  tells  us  that  on  a  certain 
Sabbath  Jesus  was  dining  in  the  house  of 
one  of  the  rulers  of  the  Pharisees,  and  it 
was  there  that  the  cure  of  the  dropsical 
man  took  place.^  When  he  saw  those  who 
were  bidden  choosing  the  chief  seats  he 
rebuked  their  selfishness.^  He  told  his 
host  that  he  ought  not  to  invite  such 
people  to  dinner,  but  he  would  be  blessed 
if  he  would  invite  only  the  poor,  the 
maimed,  the  lame,  and  the  blind.^  Then 
he  spoke  the  parable  of  the  great  supper, 
the  invitation  to  which  was  slighted  by  the 
guests  first  bidden,  and  to  which  the  people 
filling  the  highways  and  the  hedges  were 
constrained  to  come.^ 


J 11.  37-52.         2  14.  1-6.        3 14.  7-11.         *  14.  12-14.         «  14.  15-24. 


174  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

(5)  By  Luke  only  we  are  told  of  the  joy- 
ful hospitality  given  to  Jesus  in  the  home 
of  Zacchseus  and  the  glad  issue  in  salva- 
tion to  that  house. ^ 

(6)  By  Luke  alone  we  are  told  of  his 
breaking  bread  in  the  home  of  the  two 
disciples  at  Emmaus,  and  of  their  recog- 
nition of  him  in  the  familiar  manner  of  his 
doing  it.^  The  table  manners  of  Jesus 
must  have  been  well  known  in  many  a 
humble  home  in  Palestine. 

In  all  the  instances  we  have  mentioned 
Luke  alone  has  preserved  the  picture  of 
the  entertainment  of  Jesus  by  private  per- 
sons in  their  homes.  We  learn  from  these 
narratives  that  Jesus  did  not  refuse  an  in- 
vitation to  dinner  upon  the  Sabbath  day, 
but,  on  the  contrary,  on  that  day  and  every 
day  he  seems  to  have  accepted  without 
hesitation  the  proffered  hospitality  of  rich 
and  poor,  of  friends  and  foes.  We  learn, 
too,  that  he  was  just  as  faithful  to  his 
ministry  on  these  social  occasions  as  he 
was   in   the   synagogues   or   at  any   other 

>  19.  6-9.  2  24.  30,  31. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  175 

place.  People  had  their  sins  forgiven  while 
he  sat  at  dinner.  Salvation  came  to  the 
home  in  which  he  was  entertained.  Some 
of  his  most  stinging  rebukes  were  ad- 
ministered to  those  who  sat  at  meat  with 
him.  Some  of  his  most  precious  parables 
and  teachings  were  first  given  on  these 
social  occasions. 

(7)  In  the  parables  peculiar  to  the  third 
Gospel  there  are  many  glimpses  of  home 
life,  showing  how  our  Lord  had  been  ob- 
servant of  many  domestic  experiences.  The 
master  of  the  house  who  rises  up  and  shuts 
to  the  door  and  makes  all  safe  for  the  night, 
the  neighbor  who  comes  knocking  loudly 
at  midnight  and  asking  to  borrow  a  few 
loaves  of  bread,  the  woman  raising  a  great 
dust  and  upsetting  the  whole  house  until 
she  finds  the  lost  coin,  the  great  banquet 
with  music  and  dancing  to  celebrate  the 
prodigal's  return — all  these  things  Luke 
lets  us  know  that  the  Lord  had  seen  and 
had  made  note  of  for  use  in  his  preaching. 
In  the  parable  of  the  mustard  seed  Mark 
says    that    the    seed    was    sown    in   the 


176  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

earth,^  and  Matthew  says  in  the  field,^  but 
Luke  says  that  a  man  sowed  it  in  his  own 
garden.^ 

XIII.  The  Gospel  of  Praise 
We  close  this  Hst  of  the  characteristics  of 
the  third  Gospel  by  noting  some  of  the 
things  that  recall  the  personality  of  the 
author  with  his  sunny  disposition  that 
made  him  beloved  by  all  and  caused  his 
praise  to  be  sung  in  all  the  churches. 

1.  The  narrative  begins  and  it  ends  with 
worship  in  the  temple.  The  first  picture 
we  see  is  that  of  the  multitude  of  the  peo- 
ple praying  at  the  hour  of  incense,'*  and 
the  last  picture  shown  us  is  that  of  the 
band  of  disciples,  spending  their  time  con- 
tinually in  the  temple  praising  God.^ 

2.  The  first  chapters  are  filled  with 
hymns  of  praise.  We  find  there  the  Mag- 
nificat, the  song  of  Mary^;  the  Benedictus, 
the  song  of  Zacharias^;  the  Ave  Maria,  the 
angel's  salutation^;  the  Gloria  in  Excelsis, 
the   song   of   the   angels^;   and   the   Nunc 

14.31.  '13.31.  'IS.  19.  «1.  10.  »24.  53. 

« 1.46-55.  M.  68-79.  8  1.28-33.  »2.  14. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  177 

Dimittis,  the  song  of  Simeon.^  Schaff  says 
of  these:  "They  are  the  last  of  Hebrew 
psalms,  as  well  as  the  first  of  Christian 
hymns.  They  can  be  literally  translated 
back  Into  the  Hebrew  without  losing  their 
beauty."^ 

They  evidently  belong  to  just  this  border 
line  between  the  two  dispensations.  They 
are  much  more  like  the  ancient  psalms 
than  the  later  Christian  hymns  are  wont 
to  be.  They  have  just  enough  of  the 
dawning  light  of  the  new  order  to  distin- 
guish them  from  the  songs  written  before 
the  Dayspring  from  on  high  had  visited 
God's  people.  The  Jewish  forms  and  fig- 
ures are  used  to  express  a  new  hope  and  a 
new  joy.  The  promise  made  to  Abraham 
is  fulfilled.  It  is  the  house  of  David  which 
is  to  be  blessed.  It  is  the  glory  of  the 
house  of  Israel  which  is  revealed.  But 
redemption  is  wrought;  salvation  has  come; 
the  day  has  dawned;  the  whole  heaven  is 
lit  up  with  hope;  the  whole  heart  is  filled 
with  peace.     These  are  Christian  hymns, 

»  2.  29-32.  «  Scha£f,  op.  dt.,  p.  665. 


178  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

but  there  is  an  indefiniteness  about  them 
that  marks  them  as  belonging  to  the  very 
beginning.  There  is  no  redemption  by 
blood.  There  is  no  forecasting  of  the 
cross.  These  things  came  in  later.  They 
do  not  belong  here  in  the  first  joy  that 
light  has  shined  upon  those  who  sat  in 
darkness  and  the  shadow  of  death. 

This  Gospel  begins  with  songs  and  ends 
with  songs,  and  there  is  singing  and  re- 
joicing all  the  way  along.  The  Gospel  ac- 
cording to  Matthew  began  with  the  wail- 
ing at  Bethlehem  for  the  children  who  were 
no  more  and  it  ended  with  sevenfold 
*'Woes"  upon  the  Pharisees  who  would  not 
be  saved.  In  the  Gospel  according  to  Luke 
the  saints  are  singing  from  the  beginning  to 
the  close.  Bishop  Alexander  said  of  the 
Magnificat:  *Tt  is  the  highest  specimen  of 
the  subtle  influence  of  the  song  of  purity, 
so  exquisitely  described  by  Browning.  It 
is  the  Pippa  Passes  among  the  liturgies  of 
the  world. "^  What  he  has  said  of  Mary's 
song  we  might  well  say  of  the  entire  Gos- 

»  Alexander,  The  Leading  Ideas  of  the  Gospels,  p.  114. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  179 

pel.     It  is   a  message   whose   melody   has 
transformed  the  hearts  of  men. 

3.  More  often  than  In  any  other  Gospel 
we  are  told  that  those  who  received  special 
benefits  glorified  God  for  them.  Matthew 
and  Mark  note  this  fact  occasionally,  but 
Luke  notes  it  again  and  again.^  Plummer 
calls  our  attention  further  to  the  fact  that 
the  expression  ''praising  God"^  is  almost  pe- 
culiar to  Luke  in  the  New  Testament.  The 
phrase  "blessing  God"  found  in  Luke  1.  64; 
2.  28  occurs  elsewhere  in  the  New  Testament 
only  in  James  3.  9.  The  phrase,  "to  give 
praise  to  God,"  is  found  only  in  Luke  18. 43. 

4.  In  the  two  books  of  Matthew  and 
Mark  the  noun  "joy"  occurs  seven  times, 
while  in  Luke  and  Acts  it  is  found  thirteen 
times.  In  Matthew  and  Mark  the  verb 
"to  rejoice"  occurs  eight  times,  while  in 
Luke  and  Acts  it  is  found  nineteen  times. 
Do  not  these  facts  suggest  that  Luke  was 
about  twice  as  joyful  as  the  ordinary  man, 
and  that  he  was  praising  God  and  glorify- 


» 2.  20;  5.  25,  26;  7.  16;  13.  13;  17.  15;  18.  43. 

2  2.  13;  2.  20;  19.  37;  24.  53;  and  Acts  2.  47;  3.  8;  3.  9. 


180  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

ing  God  so  continually  that  it  seemed  to 
him  to  be  the  natural  thing  to  do  ? 

5.  The  ministry  of  angels  to  Jesus  and  to 
the  disciples  is  emphasized  more  frequently 
in  the  third  Gospel  than  in  any  of  the 
others;  and  angels  are  mentioned  twenty- 
two  times  in  the  book  of  Acts.  The  angel 
Gabriel  stands  at  the  entrance  to  this 
Gospel,  as  the  messenger  of  God  to  both 
Zacharias  and  Mary,  foretelling  the  birth  of 
both  John  the  Forerunner  and  Jesus  the 
Messiah.  An  angel  appears  to  the  shep- 
herds with  the  good  news  of  the  Saviour's 
birth  and  then  a  whole  choir  of  the  heav- 
enly host  sing  for  great  joy.  At  the  time 
of  the  great  confession  Jesus  promised  that 
the  Son  of  man  would  come  "in  his  own 
glory,  and  the  glory  of  the  Father,  and  of 
the  holy  angels."^  He  told  his  disciples, 
* 'Every  one  who  shall  confess  me  before  men, 
him  shall  the  Son  of  man  also  confess  before 
the  angels  of  God:  but  he  that  denieth  me 
in  the  presence  of  men  shall  be  denied  in 
the  presence  of  the  angels  of  God."^ 

1 9.  26.        2  12.  8,  9. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  181 

He  told  the  disciples  about  the  woman 
who  found  the  lost  coin  and  then  added, 
*'Even  so,  I  say  into  you,  there  is  joy  in 
the  presence  of  the  angels  of  God  over  one 
sinner  that  repenteth.^  He  declared  that 
those  who  attain  to  the  resurrection  from 
the  dead  are  equal  to  the  angels,  and  die 
no  more.^  In  the  wilderness  of  temptation 
the  devil  quoted  the  promise  of  the  psalm 
to  Jesus:  *'He  shall  give  his  angels  charge 
concerning  thee,  to  guard  thee,"^  and  in 
the  garden  of  agony  that  promise  was  ful- 
filled, for  Luke  records  that  "there  ap- 
peared to  him  an  angel  from  heaven, 
strengthening  him."^  However,  the  pas- 
sage is  of  somewhat  doubtful  authenticity. 
As  the  Virgin  had  had  her  angelic  vision 
in  the  beginning,  so  the  holy  women  have 
their  vision  of  angels  at  the  tomb.^  Here 
and  there  throughout  the  Gospel  we  hear 
echoes  of  angel  songs  and  catch  glimpses 
of  angel  wings.  The  whole  narrative  is 
brightened  with  their  presence  and  their 
praise. 

1 15.  10.  a  20.  36.  «  4.  10.        *  22.  43.  «  24.  23. 


182  THE  MOST  BEAUTIFUL 

XIV.   The  Gospel  and  the  ^Ian  Luke 

Our  knowledge  of  the  man  helps  us  in 
our  study  of  the  Gospel,  for  we  find  that 
the  characteristics  of  the  man  are  the 
characteristics  of  the  book.  Some  men 
may  have  the  power  of  concealing  their 
own  personality  in  their  writings,  as 
Shakespeare  had.  We  can  learn  little  or 
nothing  about  Shakespeare  himself  by 
reading  his  plays.  Most  men,  however, 
write  their  own  characters  into  the  pro- 
ductions of  their  pen.  Charles  Lamb  put 
his  own  genial  disposition  into  the  Essaj^s 
of  Elia.  Thomas  Carlyle  put  his  own 
crabbed  self  into  his  pamphlets  and  criti- 
cisms and  histories  and  prophecies.  As  we 
read  them  we  know  what  sort  of  a  man 
wrote  them.  They  are  self-revealing.  Car- 
lyle could  not  write  another  man's  biog- 
raphy without  writing  his  autobiography 
between  the  lines.  No  more  could  Luke. 
He  writes  the  biography  of  the  Perfect 
Life,  but  he  writes  it  out  of  a  heart  in  per- 
fect sympathy  with  that  transcendent  Life. 


BOOK  EVER  WRITTEN  183 

He  has  a  most  beautiful  subject  with  which 
to  deal,  but  the  subject  alone  would  never 
have  enabled  him  to  make  the  most  beau- 
tiful book  ever  written.  That  Life  Beauti- 
ful had  to  be  written  into  a  Book  Beautiful 
by  a  soul  beautiful  as  they. 

Therefore  we  shall  never  cease  to  be 
thankful  that,  although  many  others  had 
taken  in  hand  to  write  a  narrative  of  these 
matters  before  him,  Luke  felt  constrained 
to  say,  "It  seemed  good  to  me  also,  most 
excellent  Theophilus,  to  write  these  things 
for  thee  accurately  and  in  order."  The 
personality  revealed  in  that  phrase,  "me 
also,"  finds  explicit  mention  in  that  first 
sentence  of  preface  and  dedication  alone; 
but  the  influence  of  that  personality  is  ap- 
parent to  all  who  have  eyes  to  see,  and 
who  will  take  the  trouble  to  look  for  it,  in 
every  following  page  of  the  Gospel.  Dante 
called  Luke  "the  writer  of  the  story  of  the 
gentleness  of  Christ,"^  and  only  a  gentle  and 
lovable  spirit  could  have  written  a  story  so 
beautiful  in  style  and  in  content  as  this. 

*  De  Monarchia,  i,  16. 


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